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You can leave me behind

If you get a regular home, then take away all the commercial packaging, you create a kind of fairyland. The feeling is subtle, and...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 30, 20182 min read

Invisible Infrastructure

There are the things that delight you in life, and there are the support crew that hold up the things that delight you. Lets call the...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 29, 20182 min read

There are Many Ways to Connect

When I meet little girls, I could ask them about school, but that would bore them and bore me. So instead, I do a pretty hairstyle for...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 29, 20182 min read

Year's End Big Clean, or Big Laze?

I don't know which to do. Japanese spend the last week of the year doing O-soji, or Big Clean. They scrub every surface, change the paper...

Communication

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 27, 20181 min read

This Boxing Day, Inoculate Yourself Against Bargains

Its good practice to periodically roam your home and interview your possessions. Useful questions include : 'How are you supporting me to...

Cool Japan

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 26, 20182 min read

Turning Around a Failed Christmas

It was more than 20 years ago, and my littlest sister had come to visit me in Tokyo. She was still a teenager, and had a beautiful...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 25, 20182 min read

Flat people

My mother had to walk past the Orthodox Church to visit me one year, and was very concerned about something when she arrived. "Its the...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 24, 20182 min read

Merry and Care-Free

'Drive carefully', my friends would tell me. Since they already know I don't do small talk, I ask them 'How?'. Then things get creative....

Create the Future

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 23, 20182 min read

Turn Your Life Inside Out: a Beginner's guide

Image: Swiss Family Robinson Tree house, Tokyo Disneyland. The moon is full tonight, and on this solstice day the sun was at its longest...

Create the Future

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 21, 20182 min read

How to Cross a Threshold.

Something wonderful about my youngest brother is his Entrance Hello. He has been doing it for years. Its not just 'Hi, Im here'. Its not...

Create the Future

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 21, 20182 min read

Plans can be Costly and No Fun.

'Start with a good plan' is something designers with no experience say when describing how to make a Permaculture Ecosystem garden. ...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 19, 20182 min read

The useful things ARE the decoration

In Japanese tea ceremony, when a tray of sweets is passed around, you choose your sweet in a way that leaves a pleasing arrangment...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 19, 20181 min read

Creative Void, and how to have more of it

Emptiness is not nothing. Its a thing in itself, and a thing of great power. This is the Chinese character 'ku'. Next time you are at an...

Cool Japan

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 17, 20181 min read

Wonderfully Unexciting Gifts

These 'gifts' won't get dopamine going, or fulfilling any pre-existing desires. They are unsuited to wrapping paper and presentation...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 17, 20182 min read

Harmony Please Luv.

Harmony isn't one of those everyday words for us Aussies. 'Come to the barbie this weekend, bring some beer and some harmony'. Nobody...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 15, 20182 min read

The Fairy Tale method, for getting where you want to go.

You can proceed into darkness and make a1000 kilometre journey, just by lightning up the 10 meters or so in front of you, till you get...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 15, 20182 min read

Increasing 'White Space' to Give You Power

We know that in graphic design, more white space increases the power of our message. Protecting 'creative void' in any area of our life...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 14, 20182 min read

Little things. Big impact.

This photo of me was taken exactly 30 years ago, when I worked for Aerospace Technologies of Australia, servicing Boeing 747s. There were...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 13, 20182 min read

The Pretty Basket Trap

There's a pest trap called the Cockroach Hotel. The slogan was pretty cute: ‘They check in, but they sure don’t check out. ‘ I've noticed...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 12, 20181 min read

'Please' is for favours, not orders

When you have no claim on someone, yet you hope they will be magnanimous, its a useful word. 'Please sir', may I have some more?' When...

Cecilia Macaulay

Dec 11, 20182 min read