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Feng Shui Design Glossary

For a quick feng shui decorating fix-up, turn to these accessories and Chinese symbols sure to bring harmony in your home's bagua.

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Feng shui (pronounced fung shway), is the ancient Chinese art of placement to create good chi throughout a home. If you're interested in the princicples of feng shui — but don't know where to start — here's a quick list of the feng shui basics you should know.

Chi — the life force of a space

Feng shui colors recommended for your home

Five elements of feng shui:
1. Wood
2. Earth
3. Metal
4. Fire
5. Water

Bagua — a feng shui map for your home that combines nine zones with nine major areas of life, called the guas (pronounced gwa). Visit HGTV.com's interactive bagua to see how you can incorporate each major area into your home for good feng shui:
1. Wealth and Abundance
2. Fame and Reputation
3. Love and Marriage
4. Family and Friends
5. Health
6. Children and Creativity
7. Wisdom
8. Career
9. Travel and Helpful People

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Feng shui experts say that touches of "passion colors" like red and pink in the bedroom are a recipe for romance. Design by Douglas Dolezal and Robert Miller.

The Southwest Corner — the segment of your house where love reigns. It governs the luck of love, romance and family happiness and can be activated by using any of the following accessories:

Mandarin ducks: A pair of mandarin ducks is a symbol of love and romance. Place a pair (not wooden) in the southwest corner of your bedroom to get your love life activated. Also place a vase with a rose behind the ducks. Be sure the sex of the ducks reflects your love preference.

Chandelier: Hanging a chandelier in the southwest corner of your home is wonderful for activating the chi energy that stimulates romance

Soft lighting: Pastel-colored lampshades with muted lighting in the southwest creates an ambiance of romance

Candles: Candles in all shapes, sizes and colors are suggestive of love.

Crystals: Natural crystals are one of the best symbols of mother earth. Rose quartz and yellow citrine work to bring you love and luck. Place them in the southwest corner of your living room.

Pink bedsheets: Pink sheets raise subtle yang energy, which enhances feelings of love and romance

Love symbols: The heart shape is the universal symbol of love. Place one in the southwest corner of your bedroom to invite love into your life. Don't hang too many paintings, pictures or caricatures depicting the gender in which you are not interested in attracting.

Lovebirds: A pair of cranes or lovebirds are symbols of love that represent devotion and togetherness. Romance blossoms when you have a picture of these in the southwest corner of your bedroom.

(Contributions to this article from Scripps Howard News Service and the World of Feng Shui.)

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