The Map vs The Territory
In , a French surveyor named Jean-Romuald stood on the edge of a marsh with a sodden map clutched in his trembling hands. The map was a masterpiece of cartography, commissioned by the Ministry of Public Works and blessed with a heavy wax seal that depicted the royal fleur-de-lis. It showed a new postal road running as straight as a spear from one village to the next.
The problem was that the straight line on the parchment ran directly through a peat bog that had swallowed three cows and a local shepherd the previous spring. Jean-Romuald knew the road should curve six hundred meters to the east, hugging the limestone ridge. But the wax seal was already dry. To suggest a curve was to suggest that the Minister’s vision was flawed.
Jean-Romuald, fearing for his pension more than the horses of the postal service, ordered his men to start driving stakes into the mud. He chose to obey the ink rather than the earth.
We do this every day in the world of high-end interiors, though usually with less mud and more expensive wallpaper.
The Invisible Client
The scene is almost always the same. Ava, an interior designer who hasn’t