I'm a Feng Shui consultant and these are the 5 crucial areas to clean in your home ahead of the Feng Shui new year

You may wonder why you’re experiencing an increasing sense of anticipation as the end of January comes into view. I’ll let you into a secret – the energy of your home is responding to the impending Feng Shui New Year on February 4, and rather like a child in the run up to a birthday, it’s getting ready for the excitement of an upgrade in Chi (life force energy) and a fresh, new beginning.

If you’re new to Feng Shui, it might surprise you to learn the Feng Shui New Year doesn’t coincide with the Chinese New Year (January 29). That’s because the Chinese festivities use the Lunar New Year, and the exact date moves in accordance with the phases of the moon between mid-January to mid-February.

Feng Shui, however, is more precise. The ancient masters used the Solar New Year as the beginning of their new year. This always occurs during the first week of February. If you feel restless from the impending energy change, this is the perfect time to spring clean your home. Here's exactly where to focus your efforts.

The Feng Shui New Year

In the world of traditional Feng shui, February 4 is a day of joy, rebirth and delight.

I'm a Feng Shui consultant and as owner of Interiors Therapy, this is a remarkably busy time. In the run up to the Feng Shui New Year, I'm guiding clients to prepare their homes and therefore make the most of the good fortune available to them, and you can benefit by decluttering and targeted cleaning, too.

Before you commence cleaning, it's crucial to deal with any clutter you've lost control of and remove it from your home permanently. By that I don’t mean store it in the garage and forget it’s there. This is definitely a time for ‘goodbye’, as you donate, sell gift, or trash anything you don’t use need or love permanently. This will lift the associated weight it carries from your home.

Then, I recommend a super deep clean, which I always do this in my own apartment. That said, I pace myself and begin well ahead of Feng Shui New Year to show my home an even greater level of love and appreciation than my regular housework routine allows.

Essentially, this is the most crucial time for an intentional reset of energy in the home, and harnessing it to tackle the things to clean in January before the Feng Shui new year will turbocharge your good fortune.

1. Get behind the furniture and go top to bottom

This is all about locating and dissipating stagnant energy. When you take into account the nine essential Feng Shui areas of a home, which include wealth, health, work, and relationships, it’s important to make sure each and every one of them is working effectively.

This can’t happen if these area are clogged with cobwebs and dust. Move furniture to clean behind and under it, and don't forget to go top to bottom when cleaning. This microfiber extendable dusting combo from Amazon will make short work of high ceilings, and tight spaces.

By taking the time to move things around, you’ll also notice where maintenance may be required, and spots where new damp is accumulating, and the black mold you need to get rid of. This way you catch problems early so they can be resolved with minimal expenditure.

2. Windows and doors

These are the eyes and energy access points for the home, and we always want positive vibes to feel welcome. This is not the time to hide your light.

Make sure to clean your front door, internal doors and their frames, as grime and dust can settle unnoticed around hinges and fixtures. For me, Windex, available at Target, has always been a go-to. It’s simple, readily available, and does a brilliant job.

You can also easily make your own DIY cleaning solution. Mix a 1:1 ratio of tap water and vinegar. Adding a tiny dot of dish soap, such as Dawn available at Walmart, will acts as surfactant, helping your mix grip the dirt and surface.

3. Cabinets and closets

Your home is a mirror of your experience, so when spaces which are used for storage are barely opened from one year to the next, this is likely to cause obstacles and difficulties in a variety of ways.

If you live, like Monica from ‘Friends’, in a pristine home with secretly overflowing closets, you’ll find yourself constantly challenged and stressed, hidden chaos is still bringing chaotic situations straight at you.

Unfortunately, visual clutter and hidden clutter is always going to impact your well being and your Feng Shui energy, so clear any backlog in your home, and you’ll reap the benefits in other parts of your existence too.

If you don't know where to begin, pick a particularly troublesome area and go from there. Here are some of Homes & Gardens key decluttering guides to help:

• How to declutter kitchen cabinets
• How to declutter your bedroom
• How to declutter your closet
• Small living room decluttering checklist
• How to declutter a garage
• How to declutter the attic
• How to declutter sentimental items
• How to declutter when feeling overwhelmed
• Decluttering golden rules

4. Clean the kitchen

Regardless of its location in your Feng Shui bagua (the energy map of your home), it’s vital to keep the kitchen fresh, clean and unburdened by anything which doesn’t need to be there. How can you create healthy, nourishing meals if you can’t find the countertop or the stove?

I recently used Interiors Therapy to relieve the pressure on an elderly client’s home and therefore her health. She’s tiny, and the upper shelves in her cabinets were inaccessible without climbing on a stool.

By taking absolutely everything out of the cabinets, (which is recommend in the Chaos decluttering method), ditching out of date products and unwanted appliances, we reclaimed so much space that she can now reach everything safely and is enjoying making meals again.

If you find cooking a real chore, reboot your kitchen to bring back the pleasure in creating good food. Our professional chefs have tips for organizing a kitchen for optimum functionality.

5. Soft furnishings

Sad to say, furry throws, blankets and those delicious decorative pillows and cushion covers may not be as clean as you’d like them to be. Comforters and hygge essentials have absorbed dust, sneezes, bugs and viruses during colder winter months and it’s time to give everything a refresh with spring on the horizon. You might also find a treasure trove of missing objects and loose change hidden under the cushions on the couch. Feng shui-wise, keeping all surfaces, including soft-furnished areas of your home healthy is a significant boost for energy.

Other areas of the home worth a clean ahead of Feng Shui New Year

You may not have time for them all, but if these areas are possible to freshn up, it will be helpful for the flow of energy too at this crucial point in the year.

Where we have them, our expert-led cleaning guides are linked below:

• Walls and ceilings
• Lamp shades
• Doors and frames
• Pelmets, coving, skirting and baseboards
• Pull everything out from corners
• Behind and under furniture. Move it wherever safe to do so
• Under beds
• Inside and outside of cabinets, bedroom drawers, kitchen drawers, and closets
• Curtains and drapes
• Wash couch cushion covers, outdoor cushion covers, throw pillows, blankets
• Vacuum under sofa cushions
• Windows, the eyes of your home
• Front door
• Kitchen cabinets inside and out
• Fridge and freezer
• Bathroom, organize your medicine cabinet
• Tops of wall mounted pictures and photos
• Shelves
• behind radiators and vents
• Remember to empty the vacuum afterwards!

FAQs

What if I already have Feng Shui remedies in place?

You should have received an update from your consultant to explain how the unique energy will shift in your home and which remedies are required in 2025.

Remember, before you relocate anything, it needs to be revitalized. Cleanse all metal, water and earth remedies in warm, soapy water. Make sure plants are super-healthy and replace any which are past their best. Refresh fire remedies as appropriate. A stopped clock will cause problems, so keep an eye on them and replace spent batteries immediately.

If you are intrigued by Feng Shui and the positive impacts it can have, I've covered in detail the things you can do to alter your home's energy and support your new year resolutions. These can be applied to your life goals at any point in the year, including love, work and health.