Is balance a natural phenomenon?

In nature, balance and symmetry can easily be found almost everywhere – in the wings of a butterfly, in a sunflower, and even in the face structures of people. It is a known fact that people have a natural tendency to be attracted to people who have symmetrically balanced looking faces. On a deeper level, symmetry in appearances represents genetic fitness. Similar to people’s tendency to recognize patterns with the gestalt theory, people are also naturally registered to not only recognize, but to favor symmetry in their surroundings. This could explain why the more physically attractive crowd are often more regularly unavailable in the dating pool, why physical birth defects are regularly looked down upon by society and why the figure on the left in the picture below is more appealing to the eye for no logical reason.

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Like any other design concepts, the idea of symmetrical balance has had its highlighted moments in history, along with its low moments as well. Examples of symmetrical balance at its finest were often found in architecture from centuries ago. Although examples of unsymmetrical balance in architecture have also been applauded in history, the concept of symmetrical balance still holds a spot of favor in people’s normal perceptions of design thanks to human nature.