SAN FRANCISCO, Ca., December 11 — Your space is lacking a little something, and it’s stressing you out. Is it color? Design? Perhaps the delightfully tranquil undercurrent of flowing water? (We’re not talking about your leaky kitchen sink, mind.) You could hire a decorator to fill in the gaps of your parlor or patio, but is it really worth the cost? Better just try to shake it off and keep reading those glossy design magazines for inspiration, right? Wrong.
How did hot deserts and small spaces give you limitless tranquility? In the Beginning. At first (and by "at first," we mean "millennia ago"), all you needed was a high-up water source, a little bit of a gravity, a place for the lovely liquid to trickle out, and bam! You had yourself a fountain. But the Hellenists didn’t feel like relying on all this lucky circumstance, so some of their engineers got together in the waning years of the B.C. era and figured out how to use water pressure to automate fountain flow.
Innovations
The Persians followed up early in the A.D. years by using geometric wizardry to put flowing water in their gardens, and in the centuries following, you couldn’t swing a cat in places like Italy, Spain, France, China, or India without hitting a garden that featured a spot of aquatic serenity. Fountain designs closely mirrored the art of the time — Renaissance fashion in 15th-century Italy, sprawling grandeur in 17th-century France — and the whole outdoor-fountain angle went indoors in the 20th century, when the constraints of apartment-style living forced resourceful integration of natural elements into interior design.
What’s In It For You?
Style. Bowls. Panels. Lights. Sculptures. Hand painting. Contemporary form or high Renaissance camp. If you’ve got a space, we’ve got a — well, of course you have a space. That’s why you’re reading.
Serenity. Hmm, let’s see. Yeah... soothing sounds, mesmerizing lights or Zen design or both, the occasional mystic mist, the whole harmony-with-nature angle... remember all that stressful stuff? Yeah, we forget too.
Sweet sounds. Here are some of your aural options: low, soothing, relaxing, adjustable, tranquil. (Not exactly nails on a chalkboard). You might not even be aware of the lulling, lapping noises, but your slow-and-smiling heartbeat has taken note.
Meet your match:
Need something to adorn your favorite table? Like the idea of a free-standing piece of peace? How about a smart bit of wall art to either hang diminutively or paint a whole panel of trickling calm? Looking to dress up your indoors or your outdoors? Like mists? Lights? Copper? Glass? Or would you rather relax and be spoon-fed our favorites?
| | Save & Share |  5% off on $250!
Take 5% off any fountain over $250. Enter coupon code FNT4U at check out. Coupon valid through 12/22/2006 at | | |
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Tell us why you're so curious -- give us a good enough story, and we'll give you the inside scoop. (Nobody wants pennies these days anyway.) Send your reply to readers@mercantila.com | | |
