Happy New Year!

How long is it okay to say that?

Social etiquette columns tend to offer precise cut‑off dates: some say January 7, some allow the entire month, and a few give you a pass until the first time you see someone in the new year.

In design practice, though, I'd like to propose that a greeting is not about the calendar; it is about what the words are building between two people.​

I'd like to think of “Happy New Year” as a threshold.

The threshold in a house marks a transition—outside to inside, public to private, noisy to quiet.

Which makes me wonder, do grooms still carry the bride across the threshold? But I digress.

As designers, thresholds are drawn deliberately. Yes, technically, it's a weather barrier and required by code. But symbolically, they signal that you are leaving one condition and entering another.

A New Year greeting can do the same thing in professional life. Use it to mark that you are stepping with someone from “last year’s assumptions and habits” into “this year’s possibilities.”

A few years ago, on January 18 (past the supposed “expiration date”), I sent a brief email to a long‑time builder I hadn't heard from in months.

The reply was almost immediate. That one “late” New Year's email, tied to a specific curiosity about the builder’s work, led to a phone call and a steady stream of work.

On January 18, “Happy New Year” was not small talk; it was the door frame. The real message was: “I'm still here, I valued our work together, and I'm willing to step into this year with you.”

Designers live by rituals, even if they are rarely labeled that way. There are the rituals of the first site visit, rolling out the trace at a client meeting, and delivering the completed CDs. These are not empty motions; they are repeatable patterns that steady your judgment when every project is, in theory, unique.

New Year greetings can be one of those rituals if used intentionally:

• With clients, they offer a natural moment to revisit expectations, timelines, and wish lists.
• With collaborators—engineers, builders, drafters—they reopen channels that may have gone quiet under last year’s urgent deadlines.
• With peers, they remind everyone that a professional community is not a luxury; it is part of staying sane and sharp in a changing industry.

Instead of asking “How long is it socially acceptable to say this phrase?”, a more useful question might be, “How often do I intentionally step through a threshold with the people my practice depends on?”

To make “Happy New Year” more than just a line at the top of an email, here are five simple rituals you can put to work in the opening weeks of 2026:

1. The project roster reset: Create a list of every active and pending project, and set in motion your plan of action for the first quarter.
2. The collaborator check‑in: Make a list of the top five people who made your work possible last year and send each a New Year greeting that names one thing you appreciated about working with them and how you plan to collaborate again.
3. The boundary reminder: Use the fresh‑start energy to restate your office hours, response times, and your core values in a friendly "New Year" email to current clients. Framing these boundaries as “how we’ll keep your project on track this year” turns good fences into part of good service.
4. The learning pledge: Choose one area where you want to grow in 2026 and make a written promise—to yourself or to an accountability partner—to take one specific step this quarter (a book, a webinar, a course, a mentor conversation, a conference session).
5. The past client reconnection: A New Year note to past clients can wish them well in their home and gently open the door for referrals without sounding salesy.
6. The community reconnection: Identify one professional community that matters to your practice and start the year by showing up to a meeting, a call, a forum post, or a shared resource, something that signals you are in this profession with others, not alone.

None of these rituals depends on the exact date. They depend on your decision to treat the transition into a new year as a deliberately designed move in your relationships, just as you would with a carefully placed threshold in a home.

This is the first Midweek Meander of 2026, and it is also the first step toward gathering fifty‑two weeks of small, durable ideas about how designers live their professional lives.

This year, expect these Wednesday notes to meander through stories, tools, and questions that help you see your own practice with fresh eyes.

If one of the rituals above sparks something—a client you plan to email, a collaborator you want to thank, a learning pledge you are finally ready to make, don't keep it to yourself.

Take one more small step through the threshold with your professional community, and forward this Meander to a fellow residential designer, inviting them to subscribe or join AIBD, so that we can all step into 2026 with the strength of a community at our side.