It’s been two weeks we are touring around in England, to be more precise in the South West of this country. Just to swipe away all prejudices: most of the time we had fantastic weather, a bit colder than expected and only once we had heavy rain. However, we learned that English people do not call it rain when it only lightly drizzle (I would call it fine rain), they make very subtle differences for the amount of rain.

This is a place I definitely need to go from time to time to recharge my batteries, for inspiration, for new trends, for something I enjoy, and just because I love this world of antiques and bric a brac.

It`s already seven years since we constructed a new spiral staircase for our house. Hagen built a wooden skeleton and I put gypsum on it, layer by layer, until it looked like an elegant, old staircase. The final surface was plastered with a mix of lime, gypsum, pigments and protected with savon noir.

When I grew up, our family spent the summer holidays camping. These four weeks together in nature were always a wonderful adventure for me. One of my sisters and me slept in a little, old tent, bought by my father when he was a young adult. That tent was made of thick cotton, closed with cotton strings which had to be interwoven in a complicated way. The cotton was impregnated with a spray and when it was raining, you were not allowed to touch it, otherwise the water would seep through the inside and this was the worst case. I guess, this is unimaginable today.

Wir alle brauchen Aufmerksamkeit, Zuwendung und Liebe, es ist ein Grundbedürfnis des Menschen. So weit so gut, so einleuchtend. Jedoch ist die Art, wie uns Zuwendung widerfährt entscheidend dafür, wie wir Beziehungen zu anderen Menschen gestalten. Es ist ein hochkomplexes Geflecht von moralischen Verpflichtungen, Bedingungen, Erwartungen und Emotionen. Zuwendung ist für unser Wohlbefinden so notwendig, dass wir sogar negative Zuwendung, wie beispielsweise Schläge, Hohn, Spott und Hass, in Kauf nehmen, als gar keine Zuwendung.