Feng Shui & New Rugs That Look Old

I’ve been going to more and more of my clients’ homes and seeing rugs that are obviously new but are designed to look old and faded. Don’t buy that kind of rug. It’s a design fad, and as with almost all design fads—it will age badly. It will look dated, but never really old. A truly old rug is a fine thing and nothing to apologize for. Just be sure to put a rug pad under it, thereby extending its life by hundreds of years.

Generally speaking, it’s best not to buy anything that’s designed to look old and used when it isn’t really. There’s an element of falseness to the item and that symbolism starts to affect the people living in the home. Furniture that is new but has a “distressed” look has very bad feng shui. I once had a client who had just purchased an expensive bedroom set for her Wealth Corner and it was “distressed.” I had to tell her that it would forever work against her. (She then became distressed.)

Old rugs are generally made of wool, a very long-lasting material. I sincerely caution against rugs made of synthetic fibers, especially if there are very young children in the home. Synthetic fibers off-gas volatile organic compounds which are not good for anyone—especially children. There are other natural materials used for rug making, cotton being common in braided rugs.

A rug should never be the most eye-catching thing in the room. That’s because it’s the lowest thing in the room, and if it draws the eye, it’s drawing it down—not a good direction to pull energy (our eyesight being energy).

Going back to design fads—I’d like end this article by quoting the gay Japanese poet Mutsuo Takahashi: “I do dislike modernism and things modern, instinctively. What’s modern may be new now but as time goes on it becomes the most dated, I feel.”