300 square feet, that is the size of our downtown apartment.
There was a time in our lives during which living in such a small home would have been inconceivable, borderline impossible even. Today, this small apartment is our favorite living space we’ve ever rented. In fact, the past year has been spent making innumerable donation runs in addition to spending many nights sorting through every corner of our home, attempting to decipher what possessions were valuable to us. All of this in pursuit of a vision of occupying a downtown studio someday.
Now, here we are, in our simple studio; enjoying the benefits of a well curated life. Purposeful, intentional and functional, is an appropriate description for the space. A year ago, we would have described our apartment as, “a mess, but it’s our mess so that’s okay”.
Except, it wasn’t okay. The apartment controlled a better portion of our time, thought and energy. Attempting to keep everything organized was always a chore, much less making sure the home was clean. Additionally, there was this constant urge to buy new decorations and rearrange each frame, knick knack and souvenir displayed on every surface available. When reflecting back, it all seems to be a great waste of time.
This new studio isn’t so distracting: in fact, it allows for more focused attention. The small space makes cleaning a much shorter, lighter task. Additionally, the possessions in the house are limited to things that are needed for daily life or, if the item is non-essential, it was brought in because it was something worth focusing on. It is incredible that, by eliminating the usual excess, so much of a difference has been made in our mental state.
Together, we’ve determined that a studio is one room for our life; which is significantly different than having a living room, dining room, guest room, bedroom, bathroom, family room, kitchen, hallway, walk in closet, guest bathroom, office room, storage room, etc.
So far, we have found this living situation appropriate for our lifestyle. Whether you are looking for a studio yourself, or are just curious about ways to better curate the home size appropriate for your family, we want to share our experience with you. Welcome to our year long experiment of life, condensed to 300 sq ft!