New Hampshire Home January-February 2023 - 98

AT HOME in New Hampshire
The Outside, In
HERE'S A QUICK INTERIOR DESIGN
QUIZ: When a seven-year-old lives in
your home, what decorating feature dominates
each and every room?
Think about that while I tell you a story.
A few weeks ago, I received an email
from a retiring couple who were getting
ready to move cross-country, from New
England to Colorado, to be closer to their
children. For three decades, they had
lived on a refurbished dairy farm. One had
been a librarian, while the other had a
long career as a lapidary. They both were
gardeners.
They knew my daughter was an explorer,
a mud and grass stain enthusiast and a collector,
visitor and climber of rocks. Over the
years, they had accumulated quite a collection
of geologic wonders, large and small,
and weren't going to haul it all a thousand
miles. There were two options.
One, take the collection and scatter it
into the woods behind their home.
Two, give it to Little Bean.
So, off we went, not knowing what to
expect but excited at the possibilities. What
awaited us was beyond our imaginations.
In the old barn, the couple's collection
encompassed nearly an entire wall. There
were dozens of boxes of fossils, petrified
wood, geodes and crystals of all sizes and
shapes. And shells as well. And feathers.
" Daddy... " My daughter was frozen in
place, a tiny Indiana Jones unable to comprehend
the wonders in front of her eyes-
like those old adventure movies where the
explorer stumbles into an ancient cave,
stacked with gold and diamonds. " Daddy,
what do we do? "
" They are yours if you want them, baby, "
I said. " We can give them a good home. "
Upon returning to our house, we
carefully laid out the boxes of treasures,
generally sorting the items, picking out
particularly beautiful ones and thinking
about a strategy for how to deal with such
an immediate, overwhelming collection.
So, remember that question I asked you
way at the top? Little Bean had an answer.
Her answer, as always, was to bring the
outside in. Nature-inspired interior design
is, of course, nothing new.
" Study nature, " the great Frank Lloyd
Wright said. " Love nature, stay close to
nature. It will never fail you. "
Frank never met my daughter.
Coupled with a wife who is a passionate
gardener, the line
between the outside
and the inside is
often surprisingly
thin in our home.
There is winter seeding.
Acorns painted
as kitty cats. Twigs
in nearly every room.
There are feathers
and there are leaves.
There is the impossible
task of trying to
keep dirt and sand
off the floors. Shells
simply materialize.
Pockets must
be checked and
rechecked before
laundry for flowers
and seeds.
And of course, there are rocks, stones,
and fossils and crystals, and they are
everywhere. So prominent are geological
wonders in our home that friends and
family can be nearly guaranteed of
receiving a " gift stone " as a present. I'm
pretty sure her uncle has a whole drawer
of them.
Little Bean even called her friends
together for a geode party, and each of
the kids got a hammer, eye protection
and their very own geode to crack open.
(To be fair, that all took place outside!)
This is all fine, even despite the
occasional indent in one's foot from
an errant rock on the floor. The concept
that connecting with nature can improve
your mental well-being, or biophilia, now
spills over into home design as well. Why
does a greenhouse have to be outside?
Why not have a living wall?
As for my daughter's biophilia, she's
spent some time creating a special place
in her room, a bookshelf-like cubby where
some of her prized possessions live. She
sleeps just feet from a prehistoric shark
tooth, a chunk of petrified wood, a bag
of sea glass, a pile of bird feathers and a
small baggie filled with what could very
well be cat fur.
The best part of bringing the outside
in is that it costs nothing. Give it a try.
Walk outside now, shake some snow off
that branch and bring it back in. Put it on
your windowsill. Plant something in your
living room. Don't hide the rocks; display
them like art.
If need be, if you need nature in a
pinch but don't have the time or ability to
find some for your home, just reach out to
us. We have plenty of rocks just looking
for a place to live. NHH
BY DAN SZCZESNY | ILLUSTRATION BY CAROLYN VIBBERT
96 New Hampshire Home | January / February 2023
New Hampshire Home January-February 2023

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