Langley architect to speak on what makes a house a home

Home.

There’s no place like it, as Dorothy in Oz found out by clicking her ruby red shoes together.

But the word is loaded in general and conjures a host of images that is different for every individual. Langley resident and architect, planner, designer and philosopher Mira Jean Steinbrecher will lead a discussion titled “What Makes a Home” at 6 p.m. Tuesday, June 28 at the Chiropractic Zone in the Sears House at Bayview Corner.

Steinbrecher has designed and built homes for nearly 30 years and will share a lifetime of insight about the meaning of home and how to enhance living space in order to have a deeper sense of home.

“It’s not about home in terms of ownership,” Steinbrecher said.

“You don’t need to own a home to have a home. It’s more about expanding on the theme that if the body is the temple to the soul, then the home is the temple to the body.”

Home is where the heart belongs, she said, and how those temples are kept is similar to a spiritual practice. If one keeps the system neat, working and in the best operating order, it is beneficial, she said.

“So the home can serve us, rather than us serving it,” she added.

Steinbrecher will discuss such notions as how to shift one’s home into alignment with one’s essential needs and values. The idea of creating real homes for real people is one that has come to the fore with the reality of the economic downturn. In these trying times, when folks are learning how to do more with less, small changes in the home may result in noticeable differences, she said.

“There are so many ways for people to do that and, as the economy tightens, it doesn’t mean there aren’t things we can do to make our homes serve us better.”

It might be as simple as just painting a room a new color to bring life and vitality to it, or a lamp with new light that can make a big physical difference, she said. The right placement of furniture, a switch or a light can make all the difference in how a resident feels about the space they occupy.

Steinbrecher expanded on this idea that small changes have the ability to align where we live with who we are.

“Home is a sanctuary and it should be safe,” she added.

She said it’s a pretty complex issue that also involves how spaces are shared and with whom they are shared. She considered the changes that happen when a partner is no longer there and the idea of helping people move on after the loss of a life partner.

Steinbrecher also said that culturally in this country, the idea of what home means has changed.

“When we talk about homelessness, it’s as if it’s a social issue. But there are a lot of people who don’t have a place to come ‘home’ to even though they have a place to sleep,” she said.

She referred to the child who might not feel safe at home and ends up couch surfing, or sleeping in the woods, or those people who feel alienated in their homes and don’t want to be there, and so stay away as much as they can. People, she said, must choose how to live in the places they call home.

“A lot of it is about safety and sanctuary and how to make sense of what we have and to fine tune it,” she said.

She prefers the European point of view of home: that it is a place to live rather than an investment.

“It’s not an investment, it’s a home!”

It’s the place that reflects who its residents are and is more than just a place to hang one’s hat. Ideally, home is a personal palace that combines a safe living space — in which relaxation and rejuvenation take place — with the place where people build and strengthen relationships with family and friends.

Donations of $10 to 15 are suggested for this event to benefit Saratoga Community Housing, a nonprofit that helps create affordable housing in Island County.