Jessi Arrington (@JessiArrington) and
Creighton Mershon (@Cr8tonMershon) are the
founders of Workshop, a Brooklyn-based creative agency, as well as
the proprietors of Small City, a new co-working space and home to
dozens of independent creative pros.
Alongside their design practice, Jessi & Creighton have grown
their co-working experience by taking on more responsibility across
three different spaces in Brooklyn. In this conversation, we
discuss the oddities and challenges of New York real estate, the
financial and logistical efforts needed to run a co-working space
anywhere, and a bit about balancing family life with all manner of
creative and business tasks.
Catch up with Jessi & Creighton on their websites
for Workshop and Small City.
Cover photo by Bekka Palmer
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Show Notes & Links
- In Fall 2007, Prescott ran the Philadelphia Marathon but also
discovered that he didn’t know any peers in the design biz
- Jessi and Prescott in Debbie Millman‘s class
at SVA in Fall
2007
- Jessi & Creighton met in the “New York Design Scene”
Jessi & Prescott, being young and wild
- J&C have broadened the definitions of “Design”
"A shared word does not mean a shared definiton."
—Debbie Millman
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"Design is about intention. We're trying to live a designed
life."
—Jessi Arrington
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- Parsons, The New School for
Design
- Jessi & Creighton founded Workshop in 2005 (and married in
2006)
Jessi & Creighton recently celebrated their ten-year
anniversary
- Workshop now practices “in-person experience design”, which
encompasses physical spaces, graphics, and time (how a person moves
through a place)
"I like to think about our projects and ask 'What happens when
we press play?'"
—Creighton Mershon
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"Nothing like your job to get in the way of your work."
—business adage
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"Keeping it small has been good for our business but bad for our
personal lives."
—Jessi Arrington
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"Airbnb is a real estate play."
—Prescott Perez-Fox
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- DUMBO,
Brooklyn (which used to be a very scrappy, creative ‘hood
is now too expensive for upstarts like Workshop)
- HOW
Magazine
- Different professions need different square feet per employee
(call centers need 90; architects need 600)
- Airbnb
- One aspect of gentrification is desk workers replacing
industrial workers
- Coney Island, as far as you can
go in Brooklyn
- Popular Science magazine
(and its predictions
of the future)
- Will self-driving cars transform commuting, and thereby the
suburbs?
- Sheepshead
Bay, Ridgewood, Castle
Hill — New York City neighbourhoods outside of
Manhattan
- Jessi & Creighton sold their Brooklyn condo and bought a
building in Louisville, KY as part of a future project and for the
ability to live in multiple cities
- Some folks are commuting to Small City from Manhattan and other
parts of Brooklyn
- Commuting is tolerable if you have a nice “work
neighbourhood”
- The Internet of
Things
-
ACH
- Carting
Companies, independant, for-profit companies a commercial space
must use to collect garbage
- “Who’s dealing with the trash!”
- Adobe
MAX
- Prescott’s
family comes from the Recycling industry
- P&L = Profit & Loss
- WeWork
- Will co-working spaces offer childcare and other services?
"Us being happy parents involves a certain amount of chaos."
—Jessi Arrington
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Tools
Techniques
- Keep your company small enough so you don’t have huge
overhead
- Look for other ways to keep a network alive aside from
conventional employees
- Use co-working studiomates for accountability and courage
- Find and reuse furniture or items, especially when found on the
street or at flea market
- Use your existing resources for client events and experiences
(no rules against that)
- Build a culture where people “take out their own
recycling”
- Work up little by little into bigger spaces, which in turn
allow you to save more and more money for future use
- Schedule a day each month to create the necessary invoices
- Keep separate bank accounts for different areas of operation
(client services vs. renting desks)
Habits
- Work to improve stopping and documenting projects and
process
- Keep your company small if you’re not an effective or natural
manager
- Always consider the trash situation following an event!
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