The introduction to living in eighty square feet and the courage to create space!

It is a very basic and yet calm kinda day, eating fresh avocado, fresh lion’s mane with extra virgin olive oil and ground rainbow peppercorn on top, with Jugo De Guanábana con pulpa. I am in the Library, a room above the a bar in San Francisco. It even used to have about 400 books on its custom built-in shelves.

There is much more to this building than the bar. Upstairs is a collection of rooms ranging from 200 square feet down to the tiniest room measuring just under eighty square feet. These rooms are SRO’s (single resident occupancy), only having a sink in the rooms, with shared bathrooms, and a laundry/bike room. The tiniest room, which I call the Library, is where I am residing while I am in San Francisco.

I originally started writing this post back in November 2021. I was only writing about the eighty square foot room, not the building, and my experience living in eighty square feet, and designing and creating the built space, and the story about how my now husband came to find and rent the space back in 2012, after moving to San Francisco after he graduated from Florida State. I got stuck for months and stopped writing the initial pages until now. I am actually starting anew with this piece. 

I realized that I can’t write an isolated story about the space absent from the rest of the building or the potential benefits of affording humble tiny luxuries for more people to experience, whether retreating from the storms in their lives or starting over again. So, I have traveled back to San Francisco to finish writing this piece and it has been exactly two weeks in this uniquely wonderful space. It has felt like a homecoming experience! The room embodies all my creative energy that designed the space through manifesting my thoughts into a buildout of a humble tiny luxurious room with books as the focal point. Although the books have been packed and trucked away by my husband, who no longer wants to keep the room. If he only understood it is my baby and my haven all at once, it is my prototype and it grounds me, too.

There is yet another side to this tiny space. It is the community that lives within this rare wonderful space. We collected so many memories and stories from residents that shared their lives with us. Many who used to work in the bar for years and others who just passed through short term, they are gone. Some moved willingly, and some unwillingly for different reasons.

For me, I am glad I can still experience this place for the time being, because so much has changed. This is my familiar place and it is a familiar feeling. It is crazy but it is almost like I am hearing a beautiful harmonizing melody calming my consciousness all day long when I spend time in this intimate space! The power of personal time, to think and be, free and carefree all day long. I am in love with myself more so, because of this trip. I needed this clarity and safe space only to web myself back together again. I really love this space and don’t think I could ever leave it. It provides me with what I need for safety and intimacy, like I am experiencing this constant warm and pleasant firm hug! This is what humble tiny space means to me, and I hope it can provide the same comfort that many are in need of.

There are many things that could be improved about this space, too. It would be nice to have a better view, a beautiful view, of a landscape or cityscape or the ocean. I would love to recreate it, the idea of it, in many places across the globe. We all need a retreat to ourselves, but this space is much more than a retreat. When I talk about it in isolation this is what it is for me. I do see this space as being a communal satisfying experience if done right. I have been gone for months due to Covid-19 and am finally getting back after moving away because my asthma worsened from exposure to two years of California wildfire seasons. I could hardly breathe, so we escaped to Las Vegas one summer day in 2020. So, I am returning after a long hiatus and I have been keeping low-key and trying to avoid my neighbors, since I have been feeling down.

Then after three days I ran into a long time friend and resident, and what surprised me first was how excited he was to see me. “You all are back!” he said happily. It caught me off guard and I thought how sweet it felt to reconnect and be missed by someone in your community. I have also been having these sorts of moments with local small business owners I am affiliated with (optometrists, dentists, and primary care doctors) and local restaurants like Burma Love. Everyone is like, “Hi, where have you been?” After not seeing them since the pandemic it is delightful to feel seen and missed.

The small business owners have been glad to see me, just like my experience of running back into the long-standing residents still living in the community that was once vibrant above the bar. Some of those wonderful longer term residents are still there but a lot has changed over the years, like management, the food, the music, many of the residents, the experience, the fellowship between the bar and residents, the perks of living above the bar (bringing pitchers of beer up to your room, getting discounted food, and discounted rent for providing services for the building). There isn’t as strong of a community harmony anymore. It has been broken down just the same way your favorite retail space closed its doors after decades of existing. I wish there was a way to keep these little gems and treasures around for the long term and to help secure their place in the fabric of our environments as functional and luxurious urban centers and communities, functional and luxurious communal living experiences and architecture, functional and luxurious tiny spaces. 

Not to say these changes were unnecessary or avoidable, but the changes were done without considering the residents that lived there long term or the small businesses that were thriving for decades before being priced out or pushed out for other reasons.

What if we can extend the same offer of protection that historic businesses get to residents who are a part of a community as renters of commercial spaces or residential spaces. The protection could continue to exist after building ownership changes or real estate prices increase. As long as we have this broken power dynamic it will continue to destroy the heart of the community senselessly, the very thing that webs a sustainable and successful city together.

There are many lessons learned and experiences living in eighty square feet that have opened my eyes to a new and different lifestyle. It has helped me come close to what has existed inside me for all my life, but now I have the clarity to see it clearly after stepping outside of cultural expectations and my fears.

It is a wonderful luxury to wake up and be able to just get to it without any distractions other than yourself! 🙂 Strive for unique defining experiences. Those kinds of experiences define us, and mold us to be more resilient and adaptive for our futures, and change the projection of the future for others. Hopefully for the good of us all!