Less stuff more happiness Graham Hill
[Music]
[Applause]
what’s in the box whatever it is it must
be pretty important because I’ve
traveled with it moved it from apartment
to apartment to apartment
sound familiar did you know that we
Americans have about three times the
amount of space we did 50 years ago
three times so you think with all this
extra space we’d have plenty of room for
all our stuff right nope there’s new
industry in town a twenty two billion
dollar 2.2 billion square foot industry
that a personal storage so we’ve got
triple the space so we become such good
shoppers that we need even more space so
where does this lead lots of credit card
debt huge environmental footprints and
perhaps not coincidentally our happiness
levels flatline over the same 50 years
well I’m here to suggest there’s a
better way that less might actually
equal more I bet most of us have
experienced at some point the joys of
less college in your dorm traveling in a
hotel room camping we got basically
nothing maybe a boat whatever it was for
you I bet that among other things this
gave you a little more freedom a little
more time so I want to suggest that less
stuff and less space are gonna equal
smaller footprint it’s actually a great
way to save you some money and it’s
gonna give you a little more ease in
your life so I started a project called
life edited at life attitude org to
further this conversation and to find
some great solutions in this area
first up crowdsourcing my 420 square
foot apartment in Manhattan with
partners mu topo and Zhu Vodacom I
wanted it all home office sit-down
dinner for 10 room for guests and all my
kite surfing gear with over 300 entries
from around the world I got it my own
little jewel box by buying a space that
was 420 square feet instead of 600
immediately I’m saving 200 grand smaller
space is gonna make for smaller
utilities save some more money there but
also a smaller footprint
and because it’s really designed around
an edited set of possessions my favorite
stuff and really designed for me I’m
really excited to be there
so how can you live little three main
approaches first of all you to edit
ruthlessly we’ve got to clear the
arteries of our lives and that shirt
that I haven’t wore in years it’s time
for me to let it go we’ve got to cut the
extraneous out of our lives and we’ve
got to learn to stem the inflow we need
to think before we buy ask ourselves is
that really gonna make me happier truly
by all means we should buy and own some
great stuff but we want stuff that we’re
gonna love for years not just stuff
secondly our new mantra small is sexy we
want space efficiency we want things
that are designed for how their you use
the vast majority of the time not that
rare event
why have a six-burner stove when you
rarely use three so we want things that
nest we want things that stack and we
want to digitize you can take paperwork
looks movies and you can make it
disappear it’s magic finally we want
multifunctional spaces and housewares a
sinks combined at the toilet a dining
table becomes a bed same space a little
side table stretches out to c10 in the
winning life edited scheme and a render
here we combine a moving wall with
transformer furniture to get a lot out
of the space look at the coffee table it
grows in height and width to see 10 my
office folds away easily hidden my bed
just pops out of the wall two fingers
guests move the moving wall have some
fold-down guest beds and of course my
own movie theater so I’m not saying that
we all need to live in 420 square feet
but consider the benefits of an edited
life go from three thousand to two
thousand from fifteen hundred to a
thousand most of us maybe all of us are
here pretty happily for a bunch of days
with couple bags maybe
a small space hotel room so when you go
home and you walk through your front
door take a second and ask yourselves
could I do with a little life editing
would that give me a little more freedom
maybe a little more time what’s in the
box it doesn’t really matter I know I
don’t need it
what’s in yours maybe just maybe less
might equal more so let’s make room for
the good stuff thank you
[Applause]