Happy Birthday To US (+ 6 Tiny Lessons I Love)
This week is the 2nd anniversary of A Tiny Apt., and thanks to all of you, I've learned some things, and have a few Thank You gifts, too.
🚨💥🎟️ Hey, hey! We’ve got a little subscription special, THIS WEEK ONLY—read down for more✨✨✨
When I launched this newsletter two years ago, I knew only one thing: That I wanted to create something tied to the idea that small things were a gateway to everything. It wasn’t just about this particular smaller apartment where I live now (and still love after a decade)…my muse. But also about this theme that keeps showing up in my life. In tweaking rooms. In thrift stores or sidewalks. In starting/selling a company. In writing a story. In building a house…or just a really cool outfit. The idea that our eye settles on one thing—a word or a pattern or a perfect Prada shade of umber-gold, and we go from there.
I grew up worrying a lot about a money. So much so that I think I triggered an auto-immune disease that took 15 years to reverse. And that very deep, likely generationally imprinted anxiety about not having enough hasn’t gone away. But with practice and compassion, I’ve found a way to know it and navigate it, like a tricky friend or relative, without falling into its dubious patterns like a pothole. (Speaking of potholes—not just going around them, but taking a different street entirely—listen to this recent conversation between Molly Ringwald and PJ Vogt on how she survived fame—and potholes—…it’s exceptional.)
What I’ve noticed over acknowledging 137 editions of A Tiny Apt. this month, is that there is an unexpected, very unplanned tension in this newsletter—a perceptible tug between beauty, joy, or winning the lottery one day at the thrift store, and the flip side of that—those deep (deep) chasms of restlessness or maybe regret that THAT thing we desire so badly might actually elude us forever.
And, of course, that thing could be a job, a move, or just a really stellar statement coat chair. I guess that’s the first bit I’ve learned from this whole thing that I’m sincerely grateful for: knowing that our hearts need a place to dwell in those two sides of living (and LIFE). And, that our homes + spaces—no matter how small/weird/impermanent—can stretch and change to support us, keeping us safe and engaged on that journey while we make sense of it.
Okay, a few more things I’ve learned about YOU and this newsletter in two years of creating it that feel very much worth celebrating today…and everyday….
• You’re a hopeful bunch. And thank God…there are plenty of places out there devoted to exploring/evangelizing the darker side of modern life and this will not be one of them.
• You went equally WILD/shared my fascination over three stories here—Getting Out of Debt, Collecting Legendary Gems from IKEA, and signing up for the Skinny Belt Renaissance. What these three pieces have in common, I am not exactly sure, but if I had to trace some phantom thread between them it might be this: wealth (however you define it), a cool home, and a legendary outfit are somehow/some way available to us. And we get to commune here with each other as we figure it all out.
• You believe that home is as much a part of our identity—our pasts and presents as well as our futures—and that every day, in nearly every moment, we get to choose what that story can be. Through re-reading a specific pile of books, making over our beds, deep-cleaning the carpet, rearranging a tiny kitchen, cutting our hair, or recovering from Covid. Where we live is not only about how we design our space, but somehow doing so, we lovingly design our destinies, too.
• You really GET (and I LOVE you for it) that thrifting isn’t just discount shopping. And you see as clearly as I do, that thrifting is in fact a learned skill that supports mindfulness, empathy, sustainability, creative agency, confidence, historical appreciation/respect, local economies, FUN, and bona fide bragging rights. In a nutshell: Thrifting is good medicine, and you will always learn more about why/how it’s the future of reframing our relationship with our own style right here in this newsletter. (PS: I’m launching a new series next month for Paid subscribers called “Only Thrifting” where I will have conversations with other hardcore thrifters about why we thrift, what we find, and how it makes every aspect of our lives + collections more meaningful…and amazing.)
• You are tried-and-true Personal Style Connoisseurs. Whether that’s about discovering new ways to wear our sneakers, setting up our very own corner library, or having a friend over for an love-filled 25-minute tiny apartment tour…GOOD style is in fact TRUE authentic style that comes from the heart. And like me, you just know it when you see it.
• You are building something here, too. I’m not sure if it’s a better closet, overhauling a nook at the top of the stairs, saving for a (tiny) house, or starting at the beginning of something completely NEW and unknowable (I am SO THERE w/you), but by subscribing to A Tiny Apt., you have signed up to be an unofficial part of the Builder’s Club…a Rad-tag group of dreamers, design anarchists, collectors, shaker-uppers, and style magicians who want to feel FED when they read a three-minute weekly newsletter…something you like so much you might even want to share it with someone who needs way more smiles and surprise vintage $12 YSL in their lives (scroll ⬇️ for 🪩 evidence).
Because of you—my (so close!) 10k subscribers—I have a marvelous reason to show up at my cute desk every day. To take my morning walks and birth a wackadoodle idea I can’t wait to workshop with you. Every time something great happens in my life, you all have become a part of it. Because A Tiny Apt. is where good things happen. Beautiful things. Thrifted/FOUND things. Things we weren’t sure were possible in 700 square-feet…but hey, LOOK at what we just pulled off:).
To all my Paid subscribers: Your willingness to help fund this newsletter and allow me to believe it is my vocation/a means to support myself/my family, is a GIFT. And to any Free subscribers who want to help support what we do and share here, we’re offering you a chance during this 2nd Anniversary week to subscribe for a full year at half off. That’s $25 for a full year of A Tiny Apt. It’s absolutely true that paid subscriptions to this newsletter make magic (ie: home/thrifting hauls/wide-leg pant stories!!) possible, and I really couldn’t do it w/out you.
Last thing here, just for FUN—I’m gifting four existing PAID subscribers and four NEW Paid subscribers surprise gems from my recent thrifting expeditions. It could be a piece of pottery, it could be jewelry, it could be a cool AF vintage T-shirt. But drop a comment either way that you’re down to maybe get something funky in the mail, and my editor Landon and I will choose eight (okay, maybe 10!) of you at random. To the rest of you, someday we will have an ATA multi-city-tour party, and toast each other and our thrifting heroics in person (I mean, I know SO MANY of you by name now). I seriously can’t wait ❤️.
Here’s to many more years of building A Tiny Apt. with you, for you, inspired by you. See you Thursday when I’ll be sharing the Hot List of everything I’ve thrifted over the past six weeks (bananas!)…and on that note, I leave you with this fitting room clip of me and Thelma Houston celebrating my vintage plaid YSL suit for $12 I found recently in West Palm Beach…yep, in this newsletter—Volume 🆙—dreams really do come true. xxCb
Congrats Christene! I would suggest that resourcefulness is what those three posts have in common. To me, it’s a theme throughout your work here and it is so inspiring ☺️
Love you Christene - this newsletter is a ray of light. ❤️