Drawing from neuroaesthetics, human behavior and sensory perception, we look beyond appearance to consider how an environment supports the people who experience it.
That perspective informs the way I think about beauty and design. My approach has been shaped by two decades across interiors, fashion and media, a law degree and formal study in the neuroscience of design.
Good design begins with people. It starts with listening closely, paying attention to the rhythms of everyday life and understanding how an environment can better support the lives unfolding within it. Beauty matters, not simply as something we see, but as something we experience.
Christina East
Founder & Creative Director
About Amara
A New Understanding of Design
The services
The spaces around us are continually shaping us, often long before we consciously notice their effect. Drawing from neuroaesthetics, human behavior and sensory perception, NeuroDesign brings a deeper understanding to the relationship between people and the built environment. At Amara, we bring this perspective to every project, looking beyond appearance to consider the space as a whole and what it can make possible for the people who experience it.
NeuroDesign Home Assessment
How well does your home support you? We put enormous effort into caring for ourselves: how we sleep, eat, move and tend to our wellbeing. Yet the environment where so much of life unfolds is often left out of the conversation. The NeuroDesign Home Assessment brings it into focus.
Amara considers your daily rhythms, sensory preferences, personal priorities and wellbeing goals alongside your environment to understand how your home supports you and where thoughtful changes could make a meaningful difference.
01 Begin: Upon booking, you will receive our comprehensive NeuroDesign questionnaire, along with simple instructions for sharing photographs and a short video walkthrough of your home.
02 Behind the Scenes: Once your materials are submitted, you will receive a private link to schedule your consultation. In advance of our meeting, Amara reviews and analyzes your home as a whole, focusing more deeply on the spaces and conditions most relevant to your daily experience and goals.
03 Your Consultation: During a private 60-minute virtual session, we will walk through the findings together, exploring what they reveal about your experience of home and the opportunities that could make the greatest difference.
04 Your Assessment: Within 10 business days, you will receive a personalized visual NeuroDesign Assessment with key findings and prioritized, actionable recommendations specific to your home. Your recommendations identify what we suggest changing, where and why, giving you clear direction you can implement yourself or share with your existing designer, architect or project team. For projects requiring design development, sourcing or implementation, please explore Interiors + Creative Direction.
Includes advance analysis, a private 60-minute virtual consultation and your personalized visual NeuroDesign Assessment with prioritized recommendations.
Available virtually worldwide.
Interiors & Creative Direction
Human experience at the center of the design process.
For residential, hospitality, wellness and workplace environments, Amara brings interior design, creative direction and neuroscience together from the earliest stages of a project.
We begin with the people who will experience the space: how they will live, gather, work, rest and connect, what matters to them and what the environment ultimately needs to make possible. From there, we establish a clear creative vision and carry it through every aspect of the interior, bringing beauty and human experience into every decision.
Amara can lead the interior design and assemble the team required to bring the vision to life, or collaborate with an existing team of architects, designers, builders and specialists.
Engagements may range from individual interiors to comprehensive renovations and new construction.
Available worldwide.
Human experience decides.
We experience a space before we consciously evaluate it. The eye moves. The body orients. Amara draws from neuroaesthetics, environmental psychology and principles of perception to understand how our surroundings shape the way we see, feel and move through a space.
Depending on the needs of the project, we apply these principles through observation, analysis and measurement to identify the conditions shaping a space and inform the recommendations that follow.
Science gives us another way of seeing, revealing relationships that intuition alone may miss. We bring these insights together with architecture, context and beauty to understand the environment as a whole.
Beauty is felt. It can also be understood.
The Amara Method
Color is more than a palette. It shifts with light, responds to its surroundings and changes the way a room is perceived. We evaluate color in relationship to light, material and context, rather than in isolation. Beautiful color, with purpose.
01 Color
A room quietly tells the body where to move, where to look, where to gather and where to rest. We study circulation, orientation and spatial relationships to understand how architecture guides movement and connection, and how it supports the life taking place within it.
02 Spatial Analysis
Before we consciously decide where to look, a space is already directing our attention. We analyze where the eye is drawn, how attention moves and where competing elements create unnecessary demand. The findings inform hierarchy, placement and composition. The goal is not less to see, but greater intention in what asks to be seen.
03 Visual attention
Light changes everything it touches. As it moves through a room, it transforms color, material and space. We consider its direction, quality and change throughout the day, and how it interacts with the environment around it. We do not experience light independently. We experience the room it reveals.
04 Light
Artwork by Kene Sperry
Artwork by Kene Sperry
Nature repeats patterns across scales, from coastlines and tree canopies to clouds, stone and water. Similar complexity appears in art, textiles and materials. We measure fractal characteristics to better understand the visual complexity they introduce and how that complexity may be experienced within a space. These findings inform the scale, selection and placement of pattern and art.
Fractal analysis helps inform how we consider the selection and placement of art within a space.
05 Pattern & Fractal Analysis
Sound shapes our sense of space. We consider how architecture, volume, surfaces and materials influence the way sound moves through a room. These relationships inform decisions that support both connection and quiet. A room should sound as considered as it looks.
06 Acoustics
Our relationship with nature extends beyond adding plants to a room. We consider natural light, views, material, pattern and spatial relationships that maintain a meaningful connection between the built environment and the natural world. Nature is not an addition to the design. It is part of how we understand the environment.
07 Biophillic
We experience material before we name it. Texture, weight, temperature and natural variation create the tactile language of a room. We consider how materials are experienced individually and in relationship to one another. Material is not simply a finish. It is part of how a space is felt.
08 Materiality
