- Evans and Talarico aren’t the only ones trying out something like this. Pure House, which The New York Times called a “Millennial commune,” is a Williamsburg apartment building that also creates a networking and social community for its residents. Krash is a startup that invites entrepreneurs to live in a shared living space for three to 12 months in Boston, New York, or D.C. to jumpstart their connections. Even WeWork, the massive coworking space, is planning on moving into shared living spaces, according to the The Wall Street Journal.
chooter -Interesting stuff! Thought you might enjoy the read.
Almost all the single people I know my age live with roommates. In part because it's cheaper, but also, I think, because it's less lonely. I'm something of an introvert, so the 2–4 roommates of a typical house or apartment is my ideal. I can imagine an extrovert wanting to live in a space like that. But I probably wouldn't want to visit.
As you know, I have a family so my home life doesn't lack for human interaction. However, I work from home too and I am often downstairs in the home office by myself. I do miss the interaction that comes from being in an office. Having co-workers in a close proximity to bounce ideas off of or to commiserate with is nice. I wonder if introverts tend to have less children? If so, are they being bread out of society? If I lived alone, I'd definitely not enjoy it. This is actually right up my alley.
As someone who lived in situations like this when he was younger, go for it kids. Save like a mother fucker, don't buy useless crap and fancy furniture and live simple. Then, later, when like me you realize that you need a space to call your own to be able to function in society, you can get a condo or smaller house and have the resources in place to make that happen. I did communal living, and all it takes is two bad tenants to fuck the whole system up. If one guy in the house smokes weed, soon everyone will be smoking, and not just on weekends. One person in the house a "not quite dysfunctional alcoholic?" The whole floor will feel the pain. One person a slob who does not pick up the common room? Or a tenant with bad personal hygene/ body odor/shit taste in loud music? You just singed a one year lease, buddy. And if I understand this correctly, the house is also full of your coworkers. So you work with these people, live with these people and do all the same stuff that these people do because, hey you know these folks. This is also genius from a pure evil point as well: the social pressure to never stop working is going to be immense. There will be no downtime when Barry down the hall is working at 11PM and you are trying to go to sleep because you need 8-9 hours of sleep to function. This makes me sort of angry at my parents, in a sick way. If I had no morals, I'd liquidate everything I own and set these places up in cities with lots of hipsters and high housing prices. 600SQ feet per resident, common kitchen, bath in the center of the building to save on plumbing installation and maintenance, heat and cool the place like an office building rather than residences, get 10-12 "suites" per floor at $1000/month per? Damn, you can almost see the benefits as a landlord to these things. Rents less than 1/3 normal, your own micro space, sell on the "networking" and "socializing" components and people will forget they are living in an adult version of their college dorm. Get high speed fibre and build a big common room on say the second floor, build a gym, make retail on the first floor like coffee, Panera, etc, and put these things as close to transit as you can. Hell if you are truly connected and have the money to buy a city councilman, I bet you can get government housing grants from one of those TLA's that is trying to get STEM and TECH into the city. This can be a great way to live, but you really need to know who and what you are as a person to make it work, then get lucky with the floor mates. As for me, I live in a small house on 4 acres with enough trees between myself and my nearest neighbors that I cannot see their houses until I get to the end of the driveway.
I think that part of these collaborative work environments appeal is that you aren't surrounded by your co-workers per-say, but rather by fellow virtual employees. Meaning that there may be less pressure to make sure "Barry" doesn't work harder than you because Barry doesn't even work at the same company or industry as you. However, the potential to collaborate across industries, pick up best practices and network like a mo-fo is ample. I think it's an awesome idea. Its funny to me that communal living is making such a comeback, but with a "capitalistic" twist. My parents generation had communes but they revolved around farming and shared responsibilities to keep the home, farm, and families nurtured. This new iteration seems to be all about socializing and job-productivity. -Very different. Traded in the organic farm for a bank of Mac Books and the marijuana growing out back behind the compost for a craft-cocktail bar. -This isn't our parents commune.
Reading this, I went back and reread that part of the article. That changes this a bit, and makes it more palatable for me. If you get lucky and get into a floor with a bunch of people who are driven, smart, and working on complex problems I can see this being better than a year in college for learning work habits and skills.I think that part of these collaborative work environments appeal is that you aren't surrounded by your co-workers per-say, but rather by fellow virtual employees. Meaning that there may be less pressure to make sure "Barry" doesn't work harder than you because Barry doesn't even work at the same company or industry as you. However, the potential to collaborate across industries, pick up best practices and network like a mo-fo is ample. I think it's an awesome idea.
Hey c_hawkthorne, this article somewhat involves a company in Syracuse, you should give it a read because of the proximity. I can agree with this. I am currently in a 1-bedroom by myself, because it's not particularly expensive and I shared a room this past year with someone who I fell out of friendship with. It created a situation where I wanted to give living alone a shot for the first time ever. However, it gets really lonely some nights despite living in a complex. Nobody in this complex interacts with each other which is kind of sad to me. Sometimes having a whole night to myself and not saying a single word creates anxiety and tension. I know a lot of people my age that are living by themselves though. I'd imagine many of them feel the same way. I wouldn't say it's a mistake to have spent this year in a place by myself, but once this lease is up I'd like to have a roommate, hopefully my girlfriend if we're still together and in the same area, but if not then somebody else. It'll make it easier to save a bunch more money and allow me to be more social outside of work. That's the problem, it's hard to get out and do things after work a lot of nights and sometimes it's a dreadful feeling knowing you're going home for yet another night alone.Forget communes or co-ops. Millennials, Evans says, want the chance to be alone in their own bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchens, but they also want to be social and never lonely (hence #FOMO).
Thanks for the shoutout. My dorm hall has a common lounge space and a bunch of the floormates, myself included, hang out there all the time. It really is a great way to socialize and get to know the others around you. But you still have your room to go to for any reason. I like the living style a lot. I think if we didn't have that space, I wouldn't be anywhere near as close to the people on my floor. But it also definitely depends on whether or not the people are willing to go hang out. There are people on my floor who are always in their room and don't hang out with anyone on the floor. It is a great idea and I wholeheartedly support it, hell I might live there some day, but it heavily relies on the willingness of the people to go and hang out in the common area.
The two places I lived alone, I happened to make really good friends with fellow smokers in the building. I agree that typically no one in complexes speak to each other. But, if you don't have balconies, you and your cancer stick craving buddies will become bffs while drunkly huddling in the snow at 2am. Start saying hi to people you see in the hallways and stuff. There are multiple people as lonely as you, but no one wants to be "that guy". I also often had small parties with friends at my tiny NYC apartment and would often hang a sign over the mailboxes politely warning people and leaving my cell number in case we were being too loud. The ps read "feel free to stop by and have a drink or just say hi" . A couple people actually did stop by. One 40ish year old woman who stayed for like 2 or 3 hours (it was not a good mix but she was box wine drunk and couldn't tell how awkward it was) and a gay couple who were drunk enough to have no shame and fit right in with us.
So when I was living in New York I actually checked out a few places that were similar but not nearly as hip. They were like artist compounds that were massive. Each person had a 12x12 room, there were 8-10 rooms and then there was a huge common area and a good sized balcony. It was a lot more space than a lot of 2 bedroom apartments (where I would have one roommate) but I just never could bring myself to live there. For one, it never felt like a home. You have house rules posted everywhere, you had locks on each bedroom door, and the furniture was sparse. If I had been a musician or a painter (these people were really hippie types though) it might have worked. You could tell the sparse furniture was in part due to the fact the common area was mostly used for creation, not lounging. Even though I rarely cook, I still felt uncomfortable sharing a kitchen with 8 or 10 other people. Not to mention the sharing of 3 toilets and 3 showers in weirdly divided cupboards. I assumed that handwashign and teeth brushing often happened in the shared kitchen as well, as there were only 2 sinks, one in the biggest bathroom and one in the hallway (with a load of paintbrushes in it) As much as I respect people wanting to network, the reality is, living with someone when you are 30 years old under the guise of networking is probably not the most productive or going to lead to your success. It happens in college dorms occasionally but at that point you are so happy to be somewhere new, out of your parents house, that the little things that make your personal space yours matter less. By the time students are juniors or seniors though, they typically do not live in dorms and opt for a more livable situation, typically with a friend, but not a coworker.
If I were single and more minimalist in my possessions, I think I'd be all over this. Nothing breeds community like forced proximity. Believe it or not, my mom recently lived in a place like this for a few years. She made friends there that she still talks to, and that place established a type of social network that has been unparalleled since.