DEAR READERS: At a holiday event recently, a party guest approached me with exciting news. He had solved the problem of birds pooping on his picnic table and wanted to share the secret. He has a ...

Dorothy Draper, the mother of American interior design, was a master at mixing patterns, with her liberal use of motifs and colors. She paired glossy black-and-white checkered floors and thick-striped ...

Patterns are everywhere, from the movements of the smallest insect to the rotation of planets. You’ll find them in Bruce Springsteen’s We Are Alive and in Mozart’s Requiem. You can see patterns in how ...