What Is “Living Historic”?

It all begins with wanting to honor the past while embracing the future. Whether old things bring you joy and peace of mind, or if you follow the newest trends and styles that make your life more comfortable, there is limitless creative power in combining the two. One doesn’t need to be a slave to the past or live in a museum to find beauty in the relics of yesteryear, just as one needn’t be afraid of a new ideas that might change your life. Newness is only new for an instant, and when it passes it becomes the norm, the expected, “the way it is”. Therefore, the incessant drive to change will always challenge your satisfaction with the present. What worked for you yesterday may not work for you today - and that’s okay. It doesn’t mean you start over, it means you keep tailoring your environment to fit your needs.

“The more you learn, modify and improve your past, the more you are in the position to better your future.” This guy goes a little deeper into why this is true.

Designing to be timeless is a trap. It’s the opposite of living historic. It’s living in a bubble without context, hoping that your decisions are average enough to be accepted in any future. But accepted by whom? On the one hand the idea is a noble one, but on the other is so presumptuous as to be preposterous (is the design so good that it transcends time itself?!) Everything is connected and within some sort of context, right? The desire to remove as much anachronism as possible is more along the ideas of modernism, but even that outcome is its own unique style and “of a certain time” now.

As you can see, living historic is both a mental exercise and a physical one when it comes to inhabiting a home. The challenge is to make it personal for you, and understand the problems you wish to solve within your space. Many a time these problems are what someone else might take for granted, or even prefer, so don’t let that discourage your thinking. Every problem can be solved and nothing is unsalvageable; the limits imposed are time and money. Is it more expensive to repair than to replace? Sometimes, but not all the time. Working smarter, not harder, can compensate. Finding those things that really justify the expense are how you compromise without sacrificing your ideals.

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