While Sampson Dahl's ex-girlfriend thought the old laundromat he was considering as a potential new apartment was "disgusting," he saw the potential for a great live-work space. He moved in a month later.
"I don't think a space needs to be a perfect representation of what we hope a simple mind looks like," Dahl tells CNBC Make It. "I think a space should be an imperfect representation of the people who are in it at that moment in their lives."
The 27-year-old production designer is no stranger to living in commercial spaces; he used to live in a warehouse in Chicago, so he knew going into his apartment hunt that he wanted to repeat that experience.
"I like the freedom of a commercial space, even though there are definitely fewer tenant rights," he said. "Something feels more ethical about moving into a vacant storefront that's been empty for years than taking up an apartment in some residential neighborhood that you're not familiar with."
Dahl found the former laundromat in Maspeth, Queens, in an online forum in 2019. A former tenant added a small kitchen that gives Dahl enough space to have a sink, stovetop, and toaster oven. The laundromat hasn't been in working order since 2005.
When he first moved in March 2019, the rent was $1750, and he paid two months' rent up front and an $875 security deposit. In 2021, his rent went up to $1850, and on average, he pays $120 for electricity and $60 for the internet.
Dahl is in production design, and one of the perks of the job is access to a lot of free furniture after the projects are done, so he's used that to decorate the space.
"This space enables some [my] hoarding tendencies, but I try to be as decorative with it as possible," Dahl says. "While most of the stuff is technically trash, and a lot of it was free, I try to curate it in the way that is most comfy to me."
Although Dahl loves the space he created, which also includes a songwriting and organ station, he says he only lives there because it's what he can afford right now, but he hopes to move out and have it continue to be a collaborative studio space.
"It'll just be an open store for whoever wants to come in and learn to paint or continue a painting or learn to record a song or continue a song. It's for beginners and people who are already passionate about what they do," Dahl says.
"Living in a storefront has taught me resourcefulness in a way I've never known before. I really can't be too picky about what comes my way; I just have to make the best of it. And that's the greatest skill I could ask for, he added.
"It's nothing I could teach myself; it's something you can only learn from life. That's really in line with the life philosophy I have."
17 comments:
This is called the “de Blasio effect.” !
Soon as my younger guy graduates hs..I'm outta here...5 more long years
Great idea. I'm sure the "We Want Our Freedoms" babies + assorted Q-Anons will whine and complain about someone choosing to live as he wants, and not how someone else wants.
Bidenistas have to live and work somewhere right ?
@#3 Do you know you are spreading hate and divisiveness ?
Polarization and ideological extremes causing partisan antipathy is deeper and more extensive now because of both parties. Wake Up !
"We Want Our Freedoms" No I have my Freedoms !
I'm sure the "We Want Our Freedoms" babies + assorted Q-Anons will whine and complain about someone choosing to live as he wants, and not how someone else wants.
Lol! Project much? As a "freedom baby" myself, I have zero problems with what this guy is doing. As long as he pays his rent, let him do what he likes. It's the Progressives who are dictatorial about forcing people to live based on their twisted morality. Try to not bake a cake for a trans wedding lately? Good luck with that.
Progs really think that "freedom" equals "doing what Progressives like, under threat of government punishment if you refuse."
Old story, he may be evicted by now. or homeless living in a tent.
Hipsters in Maspeth? What next?
I don't live in NY any more but still come here to read about Queens. I can tell all you NYers, there are MUCH better places to live. You won't miss NY for a minute. Yes, everywhere has it's problems but NY...the terribleness is just never ending.
""It's nothing I could teach myself; it's something you can only learn from life. That's really in line with the life philosophy I have."
What a load of yuppie/hipster horseshit"
They want stakeholder capitalism, not capitalism.
The Great Reset: You will own nothing and be happy !
@"I don't live in NY any more but still come here to read about Queens. I can tell all you NYers, there are MUCH better places to live. "
Got bored looking at that cactus growing?
@"cactus growing?"
I'm a proud NYC refugee living in a Free State.
Do you enjoy siting next to a homeless man as he sleeps on a J train in Manhattan full of piss and fecal matter ? Good stay in NY...
@“ I'm a proud NYC refugee living in a Free State. “
Lucky you, living in another blue state. Better than living in a dictatorship like Florida.
Typical of Biden illegal aliens.
Pray for all Americans trying to escape the woke disaster.
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