The Truth Is - Things Do Matter

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Nate Berkus was on OWN's Super Soul Sunday this past weekend.  I've been at home to see these episodes more over the past few weeks and am really falling in love.  I consider myself a spiritual personal.  I believe completely that my life is guided by a force greater than myself.  I believe that my presence on the sofa for the past two Sundays and not a pew in the church was divine.

Anyway, so before the show aired or right at the beginning, I sent out three tweets.  

The first tweet said -

"I wanted to go to @Nate_Berkus show before it aired. I never pursued it because I didn't feel the show was really him."

Don't throw tomatoes!

The second said-

"I thought he'd change the format. That it'd be time, once he found his sweet spot."

I really believed that the show would go on. 

The final one said-

"I feel that the book is much closer to @Nate_Berkus' soul than finding a sofa for 30 bucks. TV is hard stuff."

I got some push back.  I get it.  I think it's hard for people to believe that you don't want the same things that they do.  So when I said that I didn't want to go to the show, some people felt that I was saying it because

I had never been on the show.

Being on the show was not the problem.  I know people in TV.  I have a close friend who's a TV producer for NBC.  So access was not the issue.

I kept thinking that the show needed to evolve.  That I didn't fit in.  That Nate was so much more than what he was putting out.  In a way, I kept waiting for the Nate that I consider my design soul mate to show up.  I've always believed in the emotion that he had about his process.  The passion he brought to design. The layering of love. The appreciation of things with character and characters with story.

I told a reporter once that I loved going into homes in the South because they had so much character.  You can walk into the living room and tell a lot about the owners.  Their political affiliation (there'd be a picture of Kennedy), their religious beliefs (there'd be a picture of Jesus or at the least a cross), and the

size and members of their families.

Those are the types of homes that have souls.  When I was on Design Wars, there was one producer who would ask me over and over again, why I didn't fill all the space in the room.  Upon reflection, I guess I did it subconsciously.  I didn't do it there because I don't do it with my clients.  I always leave space for the home to evolve.  Space for the homeowner to add personal touches.

 Books are my thing. They have always been a huge part of my personal space.  I have been collecting them for as long as I can remember.  Books come to me like stray cats and I bring them in...Take care of them.

There are displays of books throughout my house.  I like for my guests to discover the books as they move through the space.  If we are in the kitchen talking about juicing, there's a book right there on the subject.  

I have novels in bedrooms and business books in the bathroom.  Everywhere you go there are books. 

A close second to books are  art and photography.  Believe it or not, I don't know that lady in the photograph.  I framed it because  I thought it was interesting that on the day she was to be photographed to forever be remembered, that she chose to sit on a sofa covered in plastic.  

The other image is a page from a book that I bought on the street of illustrated spiritual hymns. It's my favorite - Amazing Grace, so I wanted to live with it.  That's it. That's how I choose the things in my home.

"The Truth is, things matter. They have to. They're what we live with and touch each and everyday. They represent what we've seen, who we've loved, and where we hope to go next. They remind us of the good times and the rough patches, and everything in between that's made us who we are." - Nate Berkus