You can read it here or scroll down this page for a copy/paste version:
http://myoo.com/features/simple-pleasures/
Growing up in the Isles of Scilly, surrounded by water and beaches meant that many of our summer days were spent shell-seeking. Family, friends, and anyone who cared to join in would trawl the strandline looking for the brightest, biggest or most delicate shells we could spy. Bright orange “snail” shells, delicate creamy winding tusks, razor shells, or the most precious of them all—the coveted cowrie shell, or Guinea Money, so called for its history as currency in Africa.
The different spirals, lines, colors, shapes, and infinite variations kept us transfixed; like snowflakes, no two were ever the same. The end of our afternoons were spent picking over and showing off our finds before finally brushing the warm sand from our feet, shaking our towels and finishing up the day.
Years later, as adults we would still carry on the hunt. During holidays at home, it didn’t matter what was happening in our other lives, there was something comforting about being able to walk across the beach aimlessly hunting.
“We had inherently recognized the beauty and the form in each shell we’d picked up and—whether we knew it or not—they’d left a deep imprint on our souls.”
That the search for these tiny works of magic could keep us busy for so many hours was sometimes a mystery, but the treasure was always worth it. And as we grew older, the simple pleasure of this meditation on a shoreline was soothing and restful. These delicate yet hardy shells had been washed up on the beach after long oceanic journeys, still intact for us to hold, and serving as palm-size reminders to never underestimate the power of nature.
Several years ago, a piece of anonymous text arrived in my mail box enclosed in a card. It was sent by a very dear friend who had stumbled upon the prose whilst researching a project and it perhaps better than anything captures the sentiment of our beach-combing pastime and deeper draw to this very simple pleasure:
“The laws of nature created from water the first scientific piece of hard sculpture – the shell. Shells are not works of art as we recognize the term, but rather, works of organic engineering. Their perfection is absolute. Perhaps more than any other animal shape they have molded our sense of beauty. They are based on geometry, but biologically and not mathematically. Their shapes repeat, but not exactly. It must be admitted that while man with his hands and his instruments has created richer and more meaningful objects, he has never achieved the variety and consistent perfection of form that arise from this sculpture from the sea bed.”
When so eloquently described, it made perfect sense why we had spent our lives entranced, walking with our heads at ninety degree angles in almost total silence except for “oooh” and “ahh” and “I got one!” at these tiny beach-side treasures. We had inherently recognized the beauty and the form in each shell we’d picked up and—whether we knew it or not—they’d left a deep imprint on our souls.
“By encouraging us to move faster, work longer hours, earn more, sleep less, keep up, and consume more, modern life has promised us a more beautiful life than the one we have, always just out of reach.”
As someone who has worked in the fashion industry for over ten years, I know better than most that the world of design has drawn much of its ideas from nature. A glimpse at Cristobal Balenciaga’s spare sculptural works, Sophia Kokosalaki’s gently undulating lines or Alexander McQueen’s Spring 2010 homage to the oceans entitled “Plato’s Atlantis” gives us evidence of just how much nature inspires us. Yet as a race, we have moved further and further from the source of such inspiration.
By encouraging us to move faster, work longer hours, earn more, sleep less, keep up, and consume more, modern life has promised us a more beautiful life than the one we have, always just out of reach. But all we need to do is to look down at our feet on a windswept beach to know that Mother Earth has already provided all the beauty one could hope for. We’ve known it since we were kids.
Illustration by Monsieur Cabinet
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