Water Features - Indoors for Home and Office

 WHAT A TREAT - OR RETREAT?

Picture yourself instead in a quiet room of your home with an easy chair, soft lamplight, and a few bookshelves. On a nearby table is a small aquarium or an attractive table top fountain nestled among decorative, large- leafed houseplants, including a lovely arrangement of Lucky Bamboo. Whew … what are you waiting for?

The best part of this private retreat is that you can either read for pleasure, for knowledge, homework, or research. You can also sit with your laptop and jot off a few pages of a manuscript. Or you can work at the desk catching up with correspondence, telecommuting, or however you choose to spend this quiet time – all with the peaceful, calming influence of trickling water.

WHAT WATER FEATURE IS BEST FOR MY HOME OR OFFICE?

When you decide to add a decorative water fountain or aquarium to your home or office, think it through and don’t impulsively make a purchase because it looks good and appealing on the package or as a display set up in the department.

 You’ll need to consider 1) the size of your home or office, 2) the size (and ages) of your family or clientele, and 3) the application for the fountain.

1. The size of your home: Obviously, if you don’t have an extra room (such as a spare guest room) that you can remodel into a retreat complete with bookshelves and fountain, then you’ll have to rearrange what you already have to accommodate the feature. Grab your pencil and graph paper and sketch out the living room, or the bedroom, or the family (recreation) room. If it’s the family room, put the “quiet retreat” area in the corner furthest from the TV – you’ll have to insist that the TV is set on low volume!
2. The size of your family and the ages of the members. (Note, if you are considering a water feature for your office, you’ll need to relate this advice to conform to your clientele.) If your home is small and you have several people living there, it’s probably not a good idea to devote a whole corner of the living room to a nice indoor display. You’ll need to consider the attributes of limiting the water feature to a table-top fountain on a sideboard or perhaps even a wall-mounted fountain. Be mindful of the ages of the youngsters who live there. Toddlers find water fountains to be very attractive and interesting. They can’t seem to keep hands out of them. Keep in mind that if you do install a lovely fountain (whether on the wall or on a table) that it needs to be out of reach of little hands – for the sake of the child and for the sake of your fountain!
3. The application for the fountain: This is what really drives your purchase and installation of a water feature inside your home or office.

·         For instance, if you live in a hot and arid climate such as in Arizona, Nevada or New Mexico, it would be very nice to have a lovely waterfall fountain in the entry way of your home. Picture walking up the path to your front door on a hot, dry day and opening the door to find a fresh, green bubbling oasis. You immediately begin to feel cooler and refreshed. Your oasis can be a portable pre-fabricated stone pool with houseplants set around it, a wall-mounted waterfall type or even an aquarium filled with water-plants and tropical fish.

·         City or apartment dwellers may be somewhat limited in the size of an indoor water feature. This is where the table top fountains or fish aquariums come in handy. Again, if you have a spare room that you might convert into a retreat, it will do wonders in relieving stress by just affording you some quiet time to sit back in an easy chair, close your eyes, and listen to the calming sound of trickling water.

·         Recreation, family or media rooms are also amenable to the addition of a water feature. And guess what – one company has designed and is marketing a water feature combined with a CD storage tower!

·         Here’s a short list of other ideas for water features and where they may be utilized:

• Bubbling Panels of Water
• Bubbling Columns of Water
• Indoor Waterfalls
• Relaxing Displays for Doctor's Waiting Rooms
• Trade Show Displays
• Point-of-Purchase Displays (POP)
• Interactive Educational Displays
• Center Piece for Corporate Lobbies

• Wall Dividers for Restaurants and Casinos
• Water Displays for Theme Restaurants

 There are, however, a few plants that do not perform well in a humid environment and that you should never mist. See Esprit’s Water Feature page for a partial list.