Branching off from my previous blog, Post Food Scarcity, I wanted to more deeply explore something that I eluded to in that post, and that is the Community Kitchen. How a shared space amongst the community fosters a sense of togetherness while also helping to reduce the redundancies of appliances and tools since not everyone would need to procure their own. Is it possible for everyone to come together in such a way? And how does that impact the daily lives and spatial needs of the individual? Find out here:
What's your opinion on this take? Could you envision yourself living in such a community? If not, what would you change? Always happy to hear other opinions, ideas, complaints, and experiences, so feel free to share! The more viewpoints I can experience, the stronger the ideas! đź’Ş
If you made it this far, thanks for taking the time to read and hope you have a great rest of your day!!
Man, I have envisioned something like this so many times. Personally, I think communal living but with everyone having at least a room that's entirely their own is the way to go. Ideally I'd imagine your personal room being somewhere between a bedroom and a living room, in terms of size. Big enough that you could have a few people over and retreat to your space away from the rest of your "community" comfortably. But I don't need my own kitchen or bathroom to be honest. I live in a 1 bedroom apartment and I often think about how much if the space is wasted most of the time. I use my kitchen for maybe an hour per day. 10 single apartments could share 3 kitchens without running into issues. Even if people tend to cook at approximately the same time, if anything that would probably make parts of cooking easier (though to be fair it'd also make parts harder). 1 person can stir while the other cuts vegetables, cook 2 servings of rice once instead of each cooking their own serving and washing their own pots/rice cooker/utensils. I often end up throwing away food because as a single person it goes bad before I can use it all. I'd love to have someone use this half a bag of cheese I needed for pizzas that's gonna go bad before I get to it.
This is a cool idea! I'd imagine a community that collectivizes to remove redundancy in tools would also be inclined to mostly cook together for the whole community. It's this the case in your world?
If so, I come from a family of picky eaters so I could see that creating conflict as not everyone wants to eat the same thing haha. But I could also see it being an amazing opportunity to bring the community together
Yes, that would be correct! At least to the extent people are willing. I'd imagine that a whole community of picky eaters would probably self-organize in a way where everyone just cooks for themselves (Although increased exposure to new ideas and ways, after some time, would have a proximity effect and people may find new or different ways to bond). All and all I think the inclination to cook together would mostly stem from convenience, as in you would be more willing to help or accept something different if it means you get to go back to do that thing you'd rather be doing much quicker.