Psychology in Design

PSYCHOLOGY IN DESIGN

Using psychology in design is vital to the way I work because no two people are the same. It makes sense for me to approach each home, office or retail space a little differently because each client has a vastly different aesthetic or personal need. There is nothing more rewarding to me than being able to work with someone’s environment in a way that becomes a deeper process of renewal rather than a more surface focus on the aspects of beauty only.

Our surroundings are never incidental or insignificant. Our environment has the power to impact every aspect of our physical, mental-emotional, and even spiritual wellbeing. The spaces we choose to live and work in can advance our goals, stimulate our creativity, and nourish our fulfillment, or they can inadvertently stifle these things and bring the opposite result. They can help us evolve and grow, whether personally or professionally, or they can contribute to stagnation or even unhappiness and suffering.

This blog section will offer a new way to think about interior design and architecture. We will share unique design ideas that are specific to how your home or office can inspire you to feel more productive, grounded, and happy.

HOW DO WE USE PSYCHOLOGY IN DESIGN?

When I am designing a home or business, together I explore the personal and business goals and life patterns of my clients so we can set up the space to better support them. They may wish to calm their mind when they get easily overwhelmed, become creatively inspired again, set up the space to heal from a transitional time, or bring more harmony within their relationship. The space can be used as a tool to shift patterns, ways of thinking and our mood. It is not to say that you will instantly be transformed once the design is implemented, but when you are aware of things that trigger you and take them out, while replacing them with things that resonate with you in a way that trigger a sense of happiness, you have a better chance of feeling better in your internal life because of the shift in your external space.

I came to work with these techniques from my mother, Melinda Joy Miller. My mother was a sensory motor-integrative therapist in the Occupational Therapy Department at a state hospital outside Philadelphia. Over her ten year career there, she became aware that if she shifted even the environment that their clients did their therapy in, they saw a shift in their client’s developmental process that had previously been stagnated. My mother went on to study many types of modalities that would influence one’s environment and then their psyche including Native American techniques and a deeper look at the feng shui home process.

I have a theater degree from NYU Tisch where I took a lot of psychology courses as well as the study of body language which gave me an interest in people…watching how they live, how their lifestyle influences their behavoir and way of thinking. I wouldn’t call my work doing clinical studies but I have had ten years of observation and am quite awe struck all the time to see how people can shift or evolve through adding the perspective of psychology into the way I create space. I am forever grateful that my path has led me to being able to work in this way.

HOW CAN YOUR SPACE AFFECT YOUR PSYCHE?

When you feel stuck in your life and are surrounded by an environment that is cluttered with an excess of belongings that define painful memories or a décor style that no longer reflects who you are, it can have a profound effect on your mental state and quality of life. Our mission is to set up the space to stimulate a state of harmony, inspiration and well-being, supporting your self-identity.

Adding this layer to the approach to interior design cab become a deeply personal process of renewal and reconnection to self. Often, the act of transforming their space becomes a larger transformational process, of finding and enlivening their unique voice and vision. Sometimes just changing the floor plan is enough to open up the space to bring more connectivity and less closed off.

FENG SHUI WITH PSYCHOLOGY

While the media can make feng shui out to be only about color, natural elements, stimulating the bagua and the balanced flow of Qi, on a deeper level understanding psychology in design brings a depth to the feng shui design that is profound. When I teach feng shui (through the Shambhalla Institute) I always bring in the psychological philosophies into the class as it brings a depth of awareness to the choices we would make in terms of how how we will bring balance and stimulate the bagau areas depending on the sensibility, personality, needs, goals patterns and behavior of my clients. Each choice is vastly different on each project because each space and person are vastly different with very different needs and desires.