There are lots of ‘things’ that need designing. It is an inane thing to say, yes, but if you think about all the spaces and objects around you and how they contribute or detract from your life, then it is very much the opposite. It is almost all of our lived experience that a designer or artist of some discipline has influence over. The handle on your kettle, the ceiling cornices above your head, the plants in the median strip, the bottle you are drinking from, or the sculpture in the museum. Artists and designers think this way for a living, to the extreme polarising extents of abject anguish through to ecstatic pleasure. They share a deep perturbation to meddle, correct and violate. It is an urgency. It is the better ones amongst them that not only nourish us with feelings, but offer guidance to a better way of being.
Then, there is the most personal of spaces, our home. The home is far more ‘sensitive.’ It ought to be the most comfortable space for us, free from incursions on our selfhood and our family body. To build this refuge is to know what those incursions might be, to elaborate on the things that entertain and pleasure us so, and to expunge the irrelevant. This is my job; to build an intimate enough connection to my client to hear what their heart says.
Everyone is ‘design capable’ in this sense – they might just need an opportunity to build a voice around it. Everyone has feelings for their space, aware of it or not. I simply help with the edit, then help train the voice. We audit, we criticise, we distil and we subjugate the instincts just a little bit. A busy life might distract us from the essential value of the home, but there is a soul in the owner that can always be searched out and brought to bare on the walls, floors and accoutrements. It is a truly joyful enlightenment. Here begins the evolution of the home.
That is but a start.
To experience RUSSH Home in its entirety, issue one will be available on newsstands from October 20 and through our shop. Find a stockist near you.
We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging.
