By the final week of January, the North Shore begins to feel exposed again. The month’s work has settled. The quiet decisions have been made. Outside, the cold is still present, but the light behaves differently now. It lingers. It reflects.
“...the home is not a museum; it is a living structure.....”
LEAVING THINGS UNFINISHED:
This week unfolds under a Full Moon in Leo, a moment that naturally draws attention outward. After weeks of restraint, of listening and refining, the emphasis shifts toward visibility. Not performance, but acknowledgment. What is here now wants to be seen.
Under this light, the home becomes a mirror. Not of completion, but of process. What appears is not a finished vision or a resolved whole. It is a draft. And there is something steady and generous about allowing that draft to exist without apology.
We are learning to release the pressure to resolve everything at once. To resist refining edges before the form has fully declared itself. Progress, we are reminded, does not always look complete. Incompleteness is not a failure of intention. It is often evidence of care.
The Parlor Wall:
Our attention keeps returning to the Parlor.
In earlier weeks, we spoke about opening the Grand Room into this space and trusting what might follow. Now, with the structure settled, the Parlor has become a quieter study. A place to observe rather than act.
There is one wall in particular. Wide. Clear. Intentionally empty.
The instinct is familiar. To fill it. To hang, arrange, define. But instead, we are choosing to leave it untouched. Not as a placeholder, but as a decision. The wall is doing work in its current state. It gives the eye somewhere to rest. It gives the room breath. It reminds us that not every surface needs to speak at once.
Waiting, we are discovering, is part of the design. When something eventually belongs there, it will arrive with certainty. Not because silence made us uneasy, but because the moment asked for it.
Allowing the Draft:
The Full Moon has a way of making things visible. This week, what it reveals is not a finished composition, but a process in motion. A room mid-thought. A home still deciding who it is becoming.
There is strength in that. A confidence that does not rush itself.
The Epok Exercise:
As January gives way to February, take a quiet inventory of your own space:
Choose one honest corner of your home, a place still in progress where patience has replaced urgency. Notice it as it is.
Consider one change you have made this month that feels indelible. Something structural, emotional, or symbolic that will not be undone.
Spend time with what remains unfinished. Ask whether the current draft of your space reflects who you are becoming, or whether it is still crowded with remnants of who you no longer are.
The home is not a museum. It is a living structure. A place for testing, rest, revision, and return.
Let the light reveal what is already here. Sometimes the most powerful design choice is knowing when not to add another mark.