True Work-Life Fluidity
The boundaries of where we work and when we work have never been less defined.
With nearly a decade of running magazines under her belt, Elise By Olsen, current wunderkind editor-in-chief of Wallet, and her boyfriend, furniture designer Dozie Kanu, decamped from Oslo and New York, respectively, leaving the immediacy of their creative and professional communities for a small, pastoral suburb outside Lisbon. Now, the creative and accomplished couple maintain their flourishing careers from a warehouse space that they reconceived as a home and a studio, sleeping, living, and creating in the same room.
In our current climate of booming gig economies, ever-growing freelance base, and the scramble to enact legislation that will save full-time employees from being on call 24 hours a day, the boundaries of where we work and when we work have never been less defined. We spoke to Olsen about the benefits and challenges of true work- life fluidity, as well as what cities, suburbs, homes, offices, and wardrobes will look like in a more fluid future.
IRREGULAR REPORT: Tell us about where you’re living now and how you found it.
ELISE BY OLSEN: My boyfriend Dozie Kanu was based in New York for six years and I was really ready to get out of Oslo, where I grew up. I traveled a lot and he needed a bigger studio space. The states and Europe are crazy expensive, but when we came to Portugal in February, we found that we liked it. You can have a very comfortable lifestyle here. It’s warm and you can have a lot of space for a little money. We found this pretty large warehouse space in this really beautiful, little vineyard town 50 minutes north of Lisbon. [The place] was pretty trashed, but we saw the potential: It was 200 square meters with ceilings five meters high. We started renovating the space in May to make it a combined living/studio space. It’s been really fruitful for me to work and play under one roof. It was kind of ideal.
IR: How do you separate your work space from your living space? Do you?
EO: This is crazy, but we have one open room. The only room with a door that can be locked is the bathroom. So my office is under a lofted bedroom. Even my boyfriend’s studio is in there. We designed the whole space so that when you get out of bed, which is on the top, you have to move down. Then you have the kitchen and from the kitchen you go back to my office or you go to the studio. It’s loud, but there’s something about being so in touch with the work.
IR: Right — there’s not a commute standing between you and a moment of inspiration.
EO: I just want to execute immediately and the same with my boyfriend. If you spend much time commuting there are a lot of distractions. They can, of course, be very positive too, to see a lot of stuff on the way to work or meet and be with people.
IR: Artists have been existing in live/work studios for a long time, entire neighborhoods have developed out of this. Do you think this kind of architectural set up works beyond artistic practice. Will it extend to other forms of business?
EO: Work models are becoming very fluid both in terms of being hired, being freelance, and also in terms of being your own boss. I’ve been with two different publications, we work very closely together online, but I don’t think my whole staff has been in one room all together ever. In fact, I think that’s the case for every project I work on. It’s a big community of external contributors: designers, animators. It’s very much project based. That’s a tendency we’re not just seeing in publications, but in bigger companies as well. Which would mean that people wouldn’t need to live in the same location or time zone, even, to execute a project. It’s been really fruitful for me. I think there’s this understanding that you have to be based in a big city to make it, but that’s not necessarily the case.
IR: We recently read a report that even Silicon Valley executives are finally admitting that they don’t need to be in San Francisco. The tech industry can go wherever it wants and should. Do you think industries should decentralize geographically? If so, do cities serve a purpose?
EO: Silicon Valley was almost like a movement. [It made sense to be centralized], and now it’s time to move a little bit away from it. It’s been this idea in the creative industries that everybody has to be in London or New York or Paris. It is changing. It is a turning point for that. It’s about money and having a life and not being distracted. I think people want that. So I think that’s what’s gonna happen and people are gonna alter these spaces outside of the big cities.
IR: Cities can provide a lot of inspiration and heightened levels of productivity. You can run into someone on the street in New York and develop a collaboration or contact in minutes. Is it harder to find out about new things and find new people to work with without that chance or scheduled face to face interaction?
EO: I’m very lucky to be able to travel as much as I do with the work that’s beyond my publishing work, doing let’s say consulting works, lectures at schools…and that enables me to go and see a lot of stuff and be super stimulated and then come back and process it. I really appreciate that. I also really need that because at the end of the day I grew up in a suburban a really small city and I’m not used to the big city. It’s important to be able to just jump into New York or London or whatever, do the social stuff, look at stuff, and jump back out. This also gives you this outsider’s perspective.
IR: How do you build a company remotely? How do you source talent for jobs and coverage?
EO: I met my art director/business partner in a co-working space in Oslo. He’s Iranian, but he happened to be in Oslo, and we started working together. We source our contributors through social media. And that’s how we communicate with our readers. That’s how we build out of Monday meetings.
IR: What are the challenges of this kind of geographic fluidity?
EO: The biggest challenges are structure and efficiency because it takes way more time to explain something in a Facebook chat than it does face to face or on a phone call. But I guess it’s just something that we get used to. I did it for many years, so it’s very autopilot for me.
IR: How do you create work life balance if you’re living in your office?
EO: I don’t know if I’m interested in that balance. I like it to be floating into each other. I love that my life influences my work and my work influences my life, and it’s all very tied together. My boyfriend and I spend a lot of time talking about work, but we’re also lucky to be able to take some nice good walks around the house — that’s a really good thing for thinking. That’s where we have a lot of conversations and try to process information. In an office you come in at 9:00 and then you just get a lot of stuff done. When I work it’s way more on my schedule and my everything.
IR: What does your schedule look like, then. Do you have a routine? Do you have weekends?
EO: To be honest, I haven’t thought about weekends in many years since I quit school. After starting to work and starting my projects, I don’t think I’ve had any vacation because I don’t know if I want it. It’s really nice to just be able to watch a movie or relax, but even watching a movie — that’s stimulating. It gets your thoughts going and you get inspired. You want to get back to work. I had my routine when I went to school. I woke up at the same time everyday, took the same train to school, went to school, same train back, eating at the same hour, but now it’s not like that at all. Which sometimes is a little tricky when it comes to sleep.
IR: In that case, do you even need boundaries to have time for yourself?
EO: Yes, you need to have your boundaries for yourself, too.
IR: Do you think clothing will change if the lines between work and home life continue to blur?
EO: Possibly. Maybe people will just be extremely selective with what they get or have a smaller wardrobe. At home, I can wear pajamas or sweatpants. I can be very hidden, very tuned in and not think about it. When you travel, because it’s not possible to bring your whole wardrobe, you need to be very selective. I think people are going to care more and more about uniqueness and quality. That’s what I hope.
