I like seeing where people work .

Writing Space
@skybambi

 

The above comes from Instagram user, @skybambi, who posts wonderfully shot images of bookstores and coffee shops around the world. On top of that, she shares videos of her calligraphy works, which make me doubt and criticize my own handwriting on a daily basis.

This falls in line with a secret love I have: desk porn.

Oh yes, those pictures floating around on your Instagram and Tumblr feeds of serene desk settings, with perfect lighting and all those parallel-aligned notebooks and fountain pens.

*kisses tips of fingers

I love that stuff.

I understand the impracticality of it all, because honestly, who could work with all those pens and cups of espresso around them? That’s a spill waiting to happen, but still. There’s simple beauty in the posts, and the feelings they evoke. The feelings of want, as in, “I want to work there. I want to go there.”

To add my spots into the tapestry of well-shot workspaces, I have a few select spots I enjoy working in, and I’ll share them from time to time.

Above is a photo, taken today, of my working spot at The Grand in downtown Phoenix. Eagle-eyed blog readers (all 2 of you) will know this is the spot I used to describe in my Monday post, Writing Skill-Grid: #1. It’s a beautiful place outside, with an industrial/steampunk-esque look that is a rusted gem in a desert city.

However, my working spot is on the inside. Second floor loft space, in the farthest corner overlooking one of their bars. There sits a marble top table, lower than the others, with a chair that would have made Trumbo weep. Two desk lamps sit on it, though, only one of them works. There’s a power outlet right underneath the table, and if you’ve ever worked in coffee shops before, power outlets are literal wall gold.

It’s removed from the chaos of the food and beverage bar downstairs that takes up most of the floor space, but it faces the stairwell, so I can see people coming up to work as well.

It’s barely lit, catching light from the garage-sliding doors made of glass, but not that “sun scorched brightness” that forces small infants to wear sunglasses to the zoo. There’s minimal A/C, but a rotating fan, that is doing all it can to keep us thought engineers cool. We still sweat, though. Everyone sweats here.

It’s perfect.

And it’s where I love to work.