As I was reading about the keys to picking the right size and style for my new chandelier (wondering if people really go out and buy new chandeliers, but realizing that this magazine article indicates they actually do!), I see "The Golden Ratio." Sweet - Fibonacci lives, even in the pages of a home design mag! Well, not so fast...
What you don't see here is that in the paragraph above this box in the article, is the text below:
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| Ah, the Golden Ratio...just what you need to pick out a....wait, is that a chandelier? |
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| Nothing like a good 'equation' to determine how big your chandelier should be, right?
So apparently the Golden Ratio is an 'equation', cool. Though, I don't see any equal signs, and I don't even see any variables. Still, 'phi' lives on! Wait. What is that again?
Let's go back to the top image. This so-called 'equation' just says to measure the length and width of the room and add the two numbers up. Change the units to inches and that's the size you want. Um...what about 1.618...? Is that some kind of ratio between the sides of your room? Or maybe how tall and how wide the chandelier should be? Maybe you need to have the number of lights and the number of chairs at your dining table in the ratio we know as phi. Something, right?
Nope. Nothing at all related in any way to Fibonacci, the actual Golden Ratio, or the number phi. It's just a term someone made up, thinking it sounded math-y enough to catch readers' eyes. Mission accomplished but for all the wrong reasons.
Note to 'GH': next time you want to share a mathematical FORMULA (which is what this is, not an equation) and you want to give it a fancy name, make sure that name doesn't belong to something else that actually IS math-y and relevant. This is no Golden Ratio. It's neither golden nor a ratio. It's simply a way to measure your room and pick out a chandelier.
Now, if I could only find a chandelier for my 21'x13' room! Wonder how big it would be....
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