Mirror, Mirror

Hello and thank you so much for tuning in today. There are so many basic design principles that and I love talking about, and once you get a clear understanding of each one, it so easy to implement them your home. These are Big Bang for your buck, super impactful design strategies that completely change the way your home looks and functions. So many of these design principles do not require you to go out and purchase anything. Interior design and consumerism are two separate concepts. Just like the fashion industry has been completely dominated by this idea of buying new things all the time and keeping up with the trends, interior design has fallen into that trap as well. But this podcast is here to give you, my beautiful homemaker/spacemaker/creater, all the information you could possibly want to transform the space that you have, working with the tool pallet that's already in your home. I talk about all of the major design principles in the episode called “Free Your Mind,” and I wanted to take a deeper dive into some of those topics, starting with today. We are going to look at the different ways to use both symmetry and asymmetry in your home, to achieve balance. We’re going to talk about when you use either strategy, why they work or don’t, and how this major design principal can you help your whole home look designed, elegant, intentional, and have that “je ne sais quoi” that just works.

But first let’s talk about the Color Of The Week. It goes without saying, this has been a hard week for human rights in the United Staes. With Roe V Wade being overturned, emotions are high, and many people didn’t see this coming, which can create a true feeling of helplessness. But we are not helpless, and there is an entire industry of reproductive healthcare that has been preparing for this moment, for decades. There are so many funds and non-profits that provide resources, safety, and information to the general public about women’s healthcare and they need our help. Today we are celebrating one of the most prevalent institutions in this space, Planned Parenthood, and their signature blue, which has changed over the years. While often opting for a lighter, more aqua shade, the present logo uses Pantone 280 -  an anchored navy blue, which often evokes a sense of history. And rightly so, Planned Parenthood has been around since 1916, 105 years as of the time of this episode’s publishing. The great thing about navy blue, like destroying the patriarchy, it goes with everything. So feel free to use it liberally in your home. In fact, you could have a full navy blue home and it was still feel balanced, anchored, and well designed. Reproductive rights are a cornerstone of human rights and quality of life for everyone. This affects us all, childbearing or not, and we will keep pushing forward for what is right by volunteering our time, talents, and knowledge to further institutions like Planned Parenthood, to keep abortion safe and legal.

I’ve had a handful of students who seem to have developed very strong opinions about symmetry versus asymmetry very early on in their education, and I’m always trying to push them away from being so clingy to one or the other, because the truth is both strategies can work. It’s all about assessing the current situation and deciding which tactic will provide the best sense of balance in the room. Read the room, as they say.

Let’s take a quick lexicon break, as a point of clarity, to define symmetry and asymmetry. Symmetrical designs follow an invisible line, often one that runs right down the center, where one side of the composition is reflected across that invisible line. So anything done on the left side of the invisible centerline is repeated and mirrored on the right side of the invisible line. So think about the wings of a butterfly. Asymmetry is the absence of this invisible line. Anything that is organic or natural in its composition is typically asymmetrical. Asymmetry doesn’t mean there is a lack of structure, it just means that the balance of the composition is not based on a centerline, so rather than being two equal halves, there are thirds or fifths, or even two unequal halves.

Interior designers are always working with a set of givens or things that we can’t change. Whether it’s the location of windows, the placement of structural elements like columns and beams, existing electrical and infrastructure thresholds, and even on budget projects it can be as simple as the placement of a door.

Asymmetry is so present all around us, it’s part of nature.  Buildings are often asymmetrical to accommodate landscape and topography.  And often times, the outside of a building might be designed to be fairly symmetrical but then the interior rooms end up being asymmetrical in order to support the exterior. Fallingwater, one of the most famous houses in the world is completely asymmetrical in order to celebrate the beautiful body of water adjacent to it. 

Home layouts today are rarely symmetrical, unless you live in a Thomas Jefferson inspired home, whose Monticello homestead took precedent from Palladian architecture. Andrea Palladio wrote the Four Books on Architecture which outline a set of so-called rules based on ancient Greek and Roman architectural principles. Now listen closely to this, because this is the key. Jeffersonian, Palladian, Greek, and Roman are all mathematical based design concepts - each size, proportion, and placement ties back to a number or formula, and this is exactly why symmetry is associated with these styles.  Symmetry is based on a reflection, therefore fits into a mathematical design concept, it can be measured, controlled, and predicted. This design philosophy gained a lot of traction through out history because it insured consistency between buildings and also purported to be THE answer when it came to architectural styles that look good. There’s often a desire for THE answer with design, and the actual answer is that it’s completely subjective, which hardly anyone appreciates hearing, and clients, friends, family, and students alike respond so much better to sweeping, oversimplifying answers like - it has to be symmetrical, or never use these two colors together. In the case of symmetry, following a fixed math equation to figure out what your room should look like sounds a lot easier than bringing intuitive creativity! 

Not always the case with asymmetry, which often evokes mystery, nature, and wild powers that be. Asymmetry came into popular use in the late 1800’s as a rebellion against the strict mathematical rules of Neoclassical and traditional architecture.  Asymmetry allowed for mimicry of nature and experimentation. The histories of both approaches still play a role in their perceived vibes today. Let’s look at how this shakes out.

Symmetry can help a room feel very organized and pulled together, and for many, it’s easier to create because its’ rules are so straight forward. What is done on one side of the room is flipped and done again on the other side of the room. A table to left of the sofa and a table to the right. A lamp on both sides of the bed. A door in between two twin windows. Symmetry can feel like a unifying design move, especially when your home is lacking order and you want a system to tie everything together. But, that doesn't mean that everything in your house will be a matching set. You can have a collection of eclectic furniture and still arrange it in a symmetrical fashion. It all begins with identifying the line of symmetry. This is the most integral part of the furniture arranging process, if you’re doing a symmetrical layout. 

You can create your own line of symmetry or use one that already exists with in the room’s architecture.  Common architectural elements that naturally find themselves in the central area of a room include fireplaces, pairs of windows, picture windows, and sometimes doors. If you don’t have any of these elements in your room, or they are off-center and therefore not a good anchoring point for our line of symmetry, you can choose your own. Find the center of the room and decide if your line of symmetry will go from side-to-side or front-to-back, or both. The most common anchoring point for a line of symmetry in living rooms that I see is the television. I get it, we all want to be able to see the TV, but the idea that an entire room  based around an electronic device can be a little limiting, so consider alternatives.  You may even just say that your sofa is the anchoring point, and run the line of symmetry straight down the middle, cutting the sofa in half. The line of symmetry is our Northstar in terms of laying out the space and where you place furniture, art, and other objects. If it's helpful you can lay down a line of masking tape as you're laying things out. Anything that happens on one side of the line should repeat, but flipped, on the other side of the line.

If your room is naturally asymmetrical, you can consider forcing symmetry. A great example of this is a bedroom I saw by designer Eniea White. Her client had a bedroom with one small window over to the far side of the bedroom. White then covered that window with a long sheer curtain and added a second long sheer curtain on the opposite side of the room, even though there wasn't a window there. Then she placed the bed in between the two long sheer curtains. At first glance you would think that it was just set up that way on purpose and not at all an optical illusion. It made an awkward room feel stately and purposeful. But it's important to be careful with this strategy on your own because it can cause us to create elements that take up space and are extraneous, so keep your balancing elements limited to wall treatments, paint colors, and window treatments.

This will always have a more traditional look to it, symmetry that is. But like I said, if you have an eclectic or really bold mix of furniture, arranging it in a symmetrical way can balance it out. So you've got the structure of symmetry with the eclectic menagerie of your furniture collection. In this case the symmetry is happening with the placement of the furniture but not the styles and color, and that’s where we start have fun - in that area of not quite perfect.  

However, if you want to break out of the traditional bubble, and have a little bit more of a modern, creative room design, it’s worth considering asymmetry. Asymmetry can work whether the room’s architecture is symmetrical or asymmetrical, but it can be really beautiful to play up the natural asymmetry of a room. And asymmetry is very common in a single room’s layout. For instance, it's very unusual for a kitchen to be truly symmetrical, just due to the nature of the appliances it needs to house. Unless you're going to have two refrigerators and two stoves, the layout will naturally feel asymmetrical in your kitchen, and that’s not a bad thing. 

The way I often go about planning an asymmetrical space, is to first decide what, again, my anchor point is. Maybe its a sectional L-shaped sofa (a naturally asymmetrical item), or maybe it’s a little stained glass accent window in an old home. This is the element I want everyone’s eye to go to when they enter the room. From there, rather than mirroring everything around the anchor object, the focus is creating clusters of supporting elements, none of which come close to the size or shape of the anchor. I like to think of it as creating little constellations around the room. All the major elements are unique in size, but they are all dancing to the same tune. I know, it’s more abstract than symmetry. Another way to think of it is if you have a ball of clay, dividing that clay into two equal halves is effectively symmetry. Asymmetry is taking that same clay and dividing it up so that no two parts are equal, but you still have the same total amount of clay, and you want to be able to distinguish each piece from the other. So you don't want any two pieces to look too much alike. You might have a large, medium, and small piece, for instance. The key to successful asymmetrical composition is to have distinct contrast between the different pieces so, that may look like having one large section of a room be more neutral, and a smaller section with lots of color and pop to it. The very idea of an accent wall can be a balancing technique in an asymmetrical room. The important thing to remember is the different asymmetrical sections should never be too similar to each other- then it just looks like we tried for symmetry and missed. When you’re going for asymmetry, contrast is your best friend.

Another way to compose an asymmetrical space is to think of it as a series of symmetrical clusters. So rather than one big room treated as a full composition, you could have three or four lines of symmetry going in different directions, or maybe one is even at a 45° angle, and each of these clustered configurations hold their own symmetry but relate to each other in an asymmetrical way. 

Asymmetry is particularly powerful if you want to exaggerate a minimalist design. A room that is minimalist and symmetrical will end up looking cold, so in that case composing the room asymmetrically will create a more dynamic and interesting experience, if the furniture and materials you are working with are fairly plain. This is super common in the office design world, where furniture, carpet, paints - it's all pretty solid and straightforward, so creating an asymmetrical layout can help add a level of visual interest. 

Not to say that asymmetry and maximalist style can’t work well together, but in order to achieve true balance within that mix, you’ll need to consider grouping things together by color or some other organizing principle that will help to provide a little order.  

Now, this is usually the part of the show where I ask you if you have a favorite from today’s topic, but I want to urge you - playing favorites with symmetry and asymmetry is a game where no one wins. It’s all about using either strategy, based on the furniture and architecture you’re working with, and if you feel yourself prone to one or the other, I would encourage you to try arranging one room in your home with the method that feels less comfortable. You might be surprised how well it opens up your space. I hope you are taking awesome care of yourself, and I will talk to you in the next episode.