How to feng shui your home

By MO Magazine

December 29, 2022

Ensure your home is ready for the Year of the Rabbit with these tips on the art of feng shui, from rearranging your furniture to ditching your glass-topped desk.

January 22 marks the start of the Lunar New Year: the Year of the Rabbit. But is your home feng shui’d and ready to let the ‘chi’ – the harmonious flow of vital energy – in?

The symbol of 2023, the water rabbit, symbolises luck, peace and patience, while Yin Water will be the main element at play, representing intuition and diplomacy. Expect a calmer, more prosperous year, with fewer events and upheavals; this is a time to take stock and make plans for the future.

Get ready by following applying some simple feng shui principles to your home, as recommended by Judith Wendell – Mandarin Oriental’s go-to expert and the founder of New York design consultancy Sacred Currents. The idea behind the changes? To get the energy flowing, boosting your health, happiness and prosperity.

Get to know your elements

“The tools of feng shui are used to balance the life-supporting elements of water, wood, fire, earth and metal in your home or workspace,” explains Wendell. “The colours red, magenta, burgundy, crimson and pointed shapes represent fire, for example, and the fire element symbolises one’s reputation and recognition.”

When you find out more about each element, and which materials, objects and colours are associated with them, you can tailor different parts of your home to reflect these in the places where they are said to be beneficial.

The connections aren’t always obvious. The metal element is associated with the colour white, for example, while the wood element is strongly associated with green and purple.

Welcome new energy with singing bowls and fragrance

“An important principle of feng shui is to refresh your environment regularly by moving out stagnant energy, or chi, and replacing it with fresh and current intentions,” says Wendell. “Singing bowls are great for clearing and harmonising energy.” This singing bowl in hand-hammered bronze has been created exclusively for The Spa at Mandarin Oriental.

“Fragrance and candles are wonderful tools for performing rituals to bring new energy and intentions into the space,” she adds. Try a home fragrance warmer set, diffuser or atomiser to infuse rooms with your chosen scent, or light a ‘Bloom’ candle, fragranced with ylang-ylang and rose.

Make an entrance

“The front door of any environment is called the ‘mouth of chi’, and it feeds the entire space,” explains Wendell. “It’s important to create an uplifting first impression when you enter, free from clutter. That’s because the stagnant chi caused by clutter will limit potential and create issues for health, wealth and relationships.”

Avoid having an entrance hall that’s strewn with belongings, and consider storing shoes, umbrellas and coats so that they’re not always in sight. Instead of using hallways as dumping grounds, display just one or two cherished pieces – a pair of tasselled Aquazurra slippers, say, or chic silk scarf, ready to transform your outfit as you step out of the door.

Add texture to slow down the chi

Although the entrance to your home is now clear and ready to let that vital life-force of chi come on in, avoid a starkly minimalist approach when it comes to the rest of the house. “We never want chi to travel too quickly through an environment, as opportunities could be missed and health compromised,” says Wendell.

“It can be slowed down with textured fabrics, rugs, certain types of art, and crystal lighting.” Add tactile rugs and textiles to a room, and drape MO’s cocooning cashmere-blend throw over a sofa or bed.

Feng shui your home office

If you have a home office, says Wendell, position your desk chair so that you have a full view of the door, without being in direct line with it – the ‘command position’. “It’s also important to have a solid wall behind you. If that’s not possible, then have the highest chair-back you can.”

Having your back is to the door, meanwhile, is highly undesirable. If it can’t be changed, position a reflective surface in front of you, so that you can see the door and anyone standing behind you. (Take note, though – mirrors chosen for feng shui shouldn’t be artfully distressed.)

As for your desk, avoid glass or glass-topped surfaces, cautions Wendell, as these are associated with bad business outcomes. But if that’s the desk that you already have? Get yourself a big blotter, and can simply place it on top.

It’s also desirable to sit as far back in the room as you reasonably can. “The further back you sit, the stronger your position,” she concludes.

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