Harriet is one of the most endearing people I've met this year, and her home decor is stunning. You may recall her nature inspired high rise from her House Tour, where she seamlessly merges contemporary designers like Jonathan Adler with raw hand painted wood canvases. As she moves through the next season of her life, she has added elements of life and abundance to her home — all in the honor of her dear friends passing.
Architect Tadao Ando explains wabi-sabi (the celebration of imperfection) in this way:
Paired down to its barest essence, wabi-sabi is the Japanese art of finding beauty in imperfection and profundity in nature, of accepting the natural cycle of growth, decay, and death. It's simple, slow, and uncluttered-and it reveres authenticity above all. Wabi-sabi is flea markets, not warehouse stores; aged wood, not Pergo; rice paper, not glass. It celebrates cracks and crevices and all the other marks that time, weather, and loving use leave behind. It reminds us that we are all but transient beings on this planet-that our bodies as well as the material world around us are in the process of returning to the dust from which we came. Through wabi-sabi, we learn to embrace liver spots, rust, and frayed edges, and the march of time they represent.
In the passing of her dear friend Lance, Harriet has begun to study the simple concept of the cycle of life. Her newest creations include a small green moss aquarium-like utopia on her dining room table. You can see the rocks, soil and roots of this green beauty from the inside out and yet its safe in its little controlled environment. She has added the hands above her small book case which embrace the sky and are open to all the gifts of life. On top of her red credenza sits a bonsai tree, which she is grooming herself. I noted its beauty and was surprised to find out how "controlled" their growth must be, to take their rare shape. The display on her glass coffee table is buddhist sculpture on top of two books, which belonged to her friend. The most incredible part of these books: all the handwritten notes and little memos that were scribbled along the margins. She placed abalone shells centered between two metal dining chairs, which makes for great juxtaposition. Lastly, Harriet found an oyster with a pearl still embedded in it — which seems to be fitting: somehow sad, but so hopeful.
Thank you Harriet, for sharing little bits of your home with us again.
Images: Bethany Nauert
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Wow, this homeowner, architect, and writer need to do a little more research on wabi sabi. This house is not even close.
I love this place, it's gorgeous, but there's absolutely nothing wabi sabi about it. Wabi-sabi implies an absence of decoration and this place is already considered overdecorated from a wabi-sabi perspective. Maybe it's Westernized wabi-sabi?
I love the combination of stone, wood, and plants.
I suspect people will be critical of what feels like cultural appropriation: I don't know enough about Wabi-sabi, but what I do know about it is an emphasis on rustic simplicity and natural materials. I'd call this an inspired interpretation. This seems to be what the post suggests.
I love this place as well. I think it was just miss-titled. Maybe Wa(na)bi Sabi? haha, I kill myself sometimes. :)
I would like to embrace that little dog! A mini schnauzer? Please let me know what kind of dog that is, mine looks A LOT like that and he is a rescue, so it's been a mystery.
I also like the art and the concept pieces a lot. I know nothing from wabi-sabi but after the explanation, I didn't see what imperfection had to do with this absolutely perfect, well-groomed space.
Everything here seems to be mass produced, new and void of any character. Wabi.sabi embraces the simplicity and imperfections one might find in an old hand made bowl or chair etc.
Vaguely Japanese decor does not equal wabi sabi.
Wabi sabi doesn't even seem to be an inspiration here, since the place is very fussy and new-looking.
yves2013, by mass-produced and void of character, do you mean the original art by Rauschenberg, Mapplethorpe et al, or the Michael Berman piece, or the original Haines?
Cos I'm thinking, did you not look or not know what you are looking at?
focus in on the elements of the growing plants giving forth babies and then dying off and bonsai - that was and is wabi-sabi. There is beauty abounding....but the art of impermanence is still all around --you just need to look more closely and not be so narrow-minded. It's just one person's expression of transient beauty in some, not all of the photos. And what is more transient than one's life - so look up all the various explanations written by different writers, professors, etc. Try not to be judgmental - it was a piece of love.
@slowdown - take another look and be not so eager to make judgment. nothing new in this apartment - maybe clean, but certainly not new. remember - with its focus on the delicate subtelties, objects, effects in the natural world 'wabi sabi' promotes an alternative approach to the appreciation of both beauty and life. so there.
wasabi, boy you guys take your Japanese food so serious!
relax people it's just design.
but i do love this apartment, Harriet your grate.
sussu - the glass coffee table, the acrylic chairs, the wire chairs, the glass vases... are the things I thought were void of character and mass produced. Not the art.
This decorator certainly has a few relevant items in there. But to call that wabi sabi, is like saying lucky bamboo makes one home feng shui.
Don't get me wrong, I don't hate this place, It's just too perfectly manicured to be what it claims to be.
Neondv8 THANK YOU.
couldn't of expressed that better.
She is taking ideas and inspiration from the ideas of traditional wabi sabi, and creating her own little interpretations. To fill a room with faux Asian art schematics would be wrong and just weird. She's not Japanese, after all. Plus design is supposed about creating your style, going from instinct and embracing the energy of a project. If we followed all the "rules" everything would be boring and somehow generic.
I think a lot of people are responding to the words the author used rather than then the decor of the actual homeowner. Do you even recognize that they may have two different points of view?
I think the apartment is very peaceful and shows more introspection than most on AT, regardless of whether there are ghost chairs or other items you consider devoid of character.
And I have to say, I am encountering so many people on AT that I would never want to invite into my home. Not because I own anything much that's "devoid of character" or "mass produced" (yet...I may reconsider in the future) but because the level of rudeness and judgement is really offensive.
I remember loving this tour, her taste is impeccable and everything is paired down to what she loves and done very well.
Hardly mass produced.
What makes you think I haven't looked closely at these pictures? I spent longer than necessary scanning them to see where the wabi sabi influence was and I still see nothing that suggests "imperfection...the natural cycle of growth, decay, and death", "liver spots", wrinkles and other 'flaws' or natural marks of time's passage.
The place just looks like a neat, well-kept home with a vaguely Asian influence in the decor. I see no homage to the principles of wabi sabi here at all. Why do people insist on seeing things that aren't there? The person who decorated this place has a pretty way with words, but saying something doesn't make it true.
@slowdown: maybe you need you change your eyeglass prescription. Did you not see the bonsai - did you not see the forest in the (Yes) glass...old glass..recycled and hand blown glass...made by an old master....spots? maybe you should clean your lenses. wrinkles - look at the trunk of the tree. These are just gestures - the entire project was NOT all wabi-sabi - but give me time...that's all it takes, right?
@Yves2013: Can't even attempt to engage with you-it seems that you are "fixed" on an idea. But just look at the mobe pearl being "birthed" from it's "shell". Tell me, am I not at least on the right track?
Here's another post which would have been so much better had the homeowner written the tour and the description. Of course, it's not wabi-sabi, but it's a nice place.
Why not have a Q&A so we can read what the person actually thinks, rather than some erroneous interpretation?
@Palmetto: great idea - a dialogue would make this website even more engaging...yes? Thank you. "Endeavors accomplished quickly and easily rarely endure."
@hatty: Now you're just being willfully contrary. Tiny spots on a bonsai planter do not equal a wabi sabi decor scheme. Good lord!
@slowdown - the trunk of the tree was the point -not tiny spots on the planter. Again, this was not a decor scheme...get it! Just focused on three items. Don't, Please don't look at anything else -I respect your opinion, I really do.
@hatty: Your delusion is astounding. Look, any one of us can point to a number of slightly shabby items in our homes and declare that our decor is wabi sabi inspired. But most of us don't. That's because most of us know that simply saying something doesn't make it true.