The pairing of an South-octant main door (Li, 離) with a North-octant master bedroom (Kan, 坎) is one of the 64 cells in the classical 阳宅三要 (Yang Zhai San Yao — “Three Essentials of the Yang Dwelling”) door × master matrix. Under 八宅 (Eight Mansions) doctrine, this specific pairing falls into the 延年宅 outcome class.
Classical reading
離門坎主：陰陽正配富貴局。名稱延年宅，夫婦正配，水火既濟之宅。福祿壽齊全，子孝孫賢，忠義賢良，兒孫滿堂。久居剋妻，犯心腹痛、目盲之疾。
Classical 阳宅三要 verse for 離門坎主. A 延年宅 (Yan Nian house) by classical 阳宅三要 reading. The pairing produces yin-yang complementarity (water-fire harmony, 水火既濟) — a marriage-stable, generationally-prosperous configuration. The classical caveat is significant: extended residency (久居) carries health risk for the female occupant (剋妻), with attention to heart, abdomen, and ophthalmic registers.
The classical caveat that applies to this configuration: 久居剋妻. This caveat does not always activate — whether it manifests in a specific household depends on the occupants’ personal charts, the building’s period chart, and the year-on-year transit pattern. The caveat appearing in the verse signals the register a household should watch for, not an inevitable outcome.
What households in this configuration commonly experience
Households commonly report stable marriages, durable partnerships, and intergenerational harmony — though the classical text flags a long-residency caveat regarding the female occupant's health. Couples in stressed marriages tend to find this configuration helps; couples in healthy marriages benefit but should be attentive to the female occupant's health register over multi-decade residency.
Singapore-specific note: Modern Singapore HDB and condominium templates frequently produce this configuration because developers maximise unit count by placing the main door at one corner of the unit and the master bedroom at the diagonally opposite corner. Even when the resulting trigram pairing produces a classically auspicious outcome class (生氣 / 天醫 / 延年), the diagonal-opposite forcing introduces specific qi-flow concerns separate from the 阳宅三要 outcome — which is why the classical caveats (e.g., 延年宅’s 久居剋妻 register) appear in households that would otherwise be expected to thrive. Master Sean Chan’s blog post on the templated-design issue covers this thesis in full.
Why generic guidance for 離門坎主 fails
The 阳宅三要 outcome class is one of three layers that determine how a configuration actually plays out for a specific household. The other two layers — the building’s 玄空 (Xuan Kong) period and mountain/water chart, and each occupant’s personal BaZi and Zi Wei Dou Shu charts — modify the classical reading substantially. The same 離門坎主 configuration can read as “auspicious” under one period chart and shift register under another. It can support one occupant’s chart and clash with a co-occupant’s. Generic per-pairing guidance can name the classical register and the most-watched caveats, but it cannot tell you which apply to your household.
The classical doctrine itself is explicit about this: 阳宅三要 sets the foundational pairing, but the household’s actual experience requires the additional layers to read. Master Sean Chan’s blog post on the chart-house interconnection covers this multi-layer reading.