A Compartment Palace
Last week’s Time Out New York had a special feature on “small spaces” and featured a few New Yorkers who have mastered their “small spaces” through their mad dezign skillz. And when you have mad dezign skillz, you get mad propz. Zo that iz what they gotz–the propz. So I thought, hrm, I live in a “small space” let me check out this issue and read and gain knowledge and perhaps learn a few ways I can improve my “small space” from these masters of the design universe.
THEY. ARE. TOTAL. CHEATERS.
They have apartments that are 350 square feet! 350! That is the Taj Mahal when you compare it to my 187 square foot compartment. Shit, if you give me a 350 square foot apartment I would be living it up. I’d have enough room for a bed, dresser, couch, table, and a boccie court. Please, 350? That is like having a whole other wing of a house. Excuse me, where is the kitchen, I couldn’t find it because YOUR APARTMENT IS SO CAVERNOUS AND SPACIOUS, OH DEAR IS THAT MY ECHO I HEAR! Echo! (echo) Echo! (echo) Oh, don’t be silly, this apartment isn’t THAT big. Also, the kitchen is in the west wing. Go down the hall, turn left, go down another hall, and then make your second right. That is where the kitchen is, right next to the sculpture garden. You can’t miss it. If you see the Alexander Calder, you’ve gone too far.
So I decide to keep reading because I like to make myself angry by seeing how “the other half” lives it up in the warm, gentle, soft lap of luxury. It turns out they are even BIGGER cheaters because they do not read or have books (except for like one person). They also have this strange device called closets, which I am not familiar with, but apparently it is an area just for clothes and shoes. Very foreign. (Actually I do have a closet, it is a folding/accordion type door in front of a breadbox.) These apartments also get natural light, which I’ve only heard about, but have yet to see, much like a unicorn. And then I think one had a futon, but I don’t remember. I find futons offensive. I am a grown up. I should sleep like a grown up.
I have submitted my apartment to “Extreme Makeover: Your Shitty Apartment Edition” contests because it’s so small, but it’s in fact SO SMALL you can’t really do anything with it. Other than curl up in a corner so your books have more room to sit there and collect dust. The greatest number of people that have ever been in my apartment was 7. Me, a friend, and 5 firefighters, and one broken carbon monoxide alarm. But that is a different story, though with the power of deduction you can figure it out. One firefighter asked how much I paid for rent right there on the spot. Then he laughed at me and set me on fire.
Oh my god… you’re hilarious. Everyone should have their own personal Annie Choi. Do you come in blue? Oh, how I would like you in blue.
Whenever, I start feeling horrible about how much I pay for rent in LA, I always think about what it would be like in New York. Thanks for making me feel so much better.
Oh yeah that totally sucks for you though.
My bedroom in Vancouver is the size of your apartment. I just thought of that today, as I pack my 15 boxes and ready them for UPS.
Annie, maybe getting the help from one of those umpteen home makeover shows may be a good idea . The results look good on TV anyways. Hope u are able to find an apt that suits yr needs and yr pockets soon, Annie !
oh. poor annie.
the google calculator tells me my apartment has 290 square feet. but i pay for the additional spaciousness by living in munich, germany. which is a town of beer. which sucks, if you don’t like beer. which i don’t. the room that i had in new york when i lived there was 115 sqare feet. but the kitchen was somewhere else, and it was big. i guess what i mean to say is: move already. but not to munich.
man thats sooo funny! I lived in a 350 sft apartment with my girlfriend for two years… …..