Introduction to my interest in design

When I was in elementary school, I subscribed to Traditional Home magazine, Sunset magazine, and others. I would cut out my favorite images of home designs and put them in notebooks. In my spare time, I would page through them and admire my favorite textiles, mosaics, and more. I would relish the way the colors interacted with each other and the way the light washed across the fabric of couches in living rooms with extensive natural light. I wondered what it would be like to live in some of these houses or apartments that were so artfully designed. I craved that not just for myself but for people in my life who I knew would benefit from living in beautiful homes.

For the most part, I had an analog childhood experience, compared to what kids nowadays have. I had my paper interior design magazines to keep me busy. Once a week, I met up with my best friend, and we talked about how we were going to reorganize, rearrange, and redecorate our bedrooms. That usually involved something minimal like buying a new throw pillow or moving the bed from one side of the room to the other. During the winter holiday season, sometimes we would go outside and clip branches from evergreens to make holiday decor. Looking back, I can see that we wanted our spaces to be warm and inviting, to have decor that changed with the seasons, and to be a refuge from the outside world. 

I knew that design was affecting me, but I didn’t know how much. When it was time for me to go to middle school, I was excited to start at a new school that had just been built. The new middle school had a huge open area in the lobby of the first floor, where upon entering, you could look to your right through glass windows directly into the cafeteria and you could look straight ahead up a grand staircase to the second floor. I hung out with my friends in the lobby before school started. Particularly in winter, when I felt generally trapped indoors by the cold weather, this indoor spaciousness helped alleviate some of my seasonal stress, by allowing me to feel like I was outdoors, perhaps in a courtyard.  

The common area of each grade level was carpeted. There were steps on each side that were not for walking but for sitting. I think it was inspired by an amphitheater, in part. It was comfortable to sit on the carpeted steps. It was relaxing to have the ease and mobility of reclining and easily shifting seating positions. It was my first experience with non-prescriptive seating, and I liked the way our teachers made use of the space. When we broke off into small discussion groups, we would often go into the hallway to talk. The carpeted steps and the carpeted floor created a new type of “room” in the hallway. There were steps on each side facing the center of the hallway, and allowing us to face, or not face each other, depending on how we were seated. The facing steps created a more communal feeling than the chairs that face forward with the teacher at the center. The carpeted seating created a softness I had not felt in school before. This type of experience would later inform the query I center my artistic practice upon: "Can physical spaces be the catalysts that allow for healing to take place?"