The Kitchen – not just for cooking!
The kitchen is a very important factor in traditional Feng Shui. A kitchen and the stove in it are linked to the financial income of the family. In the old times, the fire brought by the stove was truly life giving, especially during the rough seasons - so this association makes a lot of sense.

Chinese medicine advises us to eat most food hot or lukewarm to keep our digestive fire, and therefore our health. It’s not surprising to see that traditional Chinese culture has a deity who takes care of the kitchen and stove. Zao Jun, the kitchen God (literally the "stove master") is the most important house deity and he is worshipped as such. There is even a "Kitchen God Festival", which is nicknamed the "Little New Year".

So what are the golden rules of a good kitchen placement? First, it’s best not to have it on the Tiger side. The Tiger side is the right side of the house, when you are inside, looking outside through the main façade. Why? Because the Tiger side relates to money. Money symbolically belongs to the Metal Element, and the last thing you want is to "burn" or melt it by putting Fire there.

Secondly, the kitchen and especially the stove have to be voided from the direct view. This means that having the kitchen in a straight line with the main door is not the best option.

More concerning is the modern trend of open-plan kitchens. This is definitely not the best based on Feng Shui principles. When I see such layout I usually recommend to at least hide the stove behind a decorative curtain or a screen that partly "closes" the open-plan kitchen.
Then we have specific sectors that we are best to avoid for the kitchen placement. The North sector presents a problem of its own, and having a kitchen there would bring a Fire and Water clash. It creates an instable Chi with potential minor health ailments. A kitchen in the Northwest sector is also not recommended as it puts "Fire at heaven’s gate" and will likely affect relationships. When it happens, a careful relocation of the stove can solve the problem.

The stove actually has many more "forbidden" locations. Without wanting to be too technical, some locations should not receive the heat or fire produced by the stove, otherwise it spoils the whole setup of a house. This is a matter of fine tuning, but I have seen spectacular results by moving stoves that were affecting the Chi of a few places.

What happens if you are stuck with such a tricky stove location and you cannot move it? My funny recommendation is to eat raw salads all year long then and not use the stove, although Chinese medicine would disagree on that! Another solution is take-aways or eating out all the time…

The bathroom…Not just for shower!
Now the bathroom presents tricks of its own as well. First, it can interact with the kitchen depending on its placement. When both the kitchen and the bathroom are on some specific locations in the house, the two have what we call a "Fire and Water clash", the same type that is brought in by having a kitchen in the North Sector.

More rules about the bathroom are ideally not to face the front door, a bedroom or a kitchen door. Why? Because a bathroom is considered to be an "inauspicious" room. It brings in a Chi of a lesser quality, with all the used water that goes down the drain. Therefore you don’t want such Chi to spoil other important locations.

Luckily this disadvantage can be cleverly used to actually benefit the whole flat or house. By locating the bathroom and toilets on one of the inauspicious house sector, or on one of your bad personal sectors, you can get rid of the influence of such sectors. The idea is that where bathroom, toilets or any water exits are placed they suppress the influence of this location on the house. Water exits are to be honest what can make a great place or break it most of the time, in my experience as a practitioner. Moving a sink can sometimes transform your whole life or business. Unfortunately I do not own any share in any plumbing business.

House and personal sectors? What the heck?
This is where we go further down the rabbit hole! It’s time to talk about the house groups…

In Feng Shui we use extensively the eight main directions and sectors: North, South, East, West, etc. Any building has a "facing" and a "sitting". The facing is more or less the main facade; while the sitting is the opposite side of the building.

So if a house if facing North, the sitting is logically in the South sector. Easy isn’t it? Well those eight main sitting directions are split into two groups. One is called the West group and includes West, Northwest, Northeast and Southwest facings. The other one is called the East group and includes East, Southeast, North and South sittings.

So once we have determined the sitting of a place, we can deduct the auspicious and inauspicious sectors of the place based on a mathematical formula. The auspicious sectors belong to the same group, while the inauspicious ones are from the opposite group. Some are best or worst than others and do not bring the same outcome. For example, for a North sitting house, the North sector is called "Fu Wei" – which is a good sector for meditation, and study, and a place of worship. The Southeast sector for such a house is considered to be the "best" location.

Here is a rough layout of the house sectors for a North facing house.

So this already gives a good indication on where to locate bedrooms, kitchen and bathroom, on top of the previous recommendations. However this is not the whole picture as each and every one of us also have some personal auspicious and inauspicious sectors. Like with buildings, we also belong to the "East" or "West" group depending on our year of birth and gender. Through a simple formula each of us can determine to which group they belong. You can find more information on the matter here: http://www.spacessential.com/feng-shui-concepts/calculate-personal-gua/

Then two options arise: either your personal "good" sectors match those of your place, or they don’t. It is then all a matter of fine tuning to carefully choose the bedroom location and the bed position. If your personal sectors are opposed to the house sectors, it is a bit trickier of course, but there are solutions to still benefit from the place.

It is not the last layer however! Some schools of Feng Shui stop at matching personal and house sectors, which is already good. However you can get much more out of your place and out of the Feng Shui benefits by matching your place with your Bazi. This is what we will see in a next article.

Laurent Langlais is a Feng Shui and Chinese oracle expert trained by the Han Wu San Yuan lineage. He is also accredited by the Uk Feng Shui Society.

Laurent Langlais is available for residential and business consultations in Feng Shui, date selection, and Chinese astrology. All readers of Dim Sum get a 10% discount on their consultation!
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