How luxury 'boffices' are saving alpha marriages in the work from home era
What everyone learned after the first lockdown is that space is one of life’s greatest luxuries. Knight Frank’s figures show that, between May 13 and June 24 this year, the number of offers accepted on properties priced between £5-10 million was 182 per cent higher than the five-year average.
In my neck of the Cotswolds, houses that were previously considered “unmanageably large” are selling in sealed bids to young bankers. One new neighbour is rumoured to be putting in separate wings, each with its own separate wifi, Apple TV, office and kitchen. “Indeed” says Charlie Ellingworth, founder of Property Vision, “some people are putting in up to four kitchens in one house. They’re using their homes in entirely new ways. We turned the living room into a gym and I am working from one of the now-redundant guest bedrooms. We’re all learning to use our homes together, but separately.”
All around us in the Cotswolds, I see large “outbuildings” and cottages being constructed. David Cameron may work in a shepherd’s hut but bankers and hedge fund managers, now quite used to the hourly Zoom call routines, want something bordering on a commute, even if it's a five-minute walk across the estate.
A separate cottage not only encourages efficiency but also doubles as a bachelor pad when and if there is a tiff, which is frequently. I know plenty of couples who after lockdown are not only sleeping in separate bedrooms but separate buildings.
A hedge-fund friend with two grown children was way ahead of the curve when he installed three kitchens in his new-build: two on either wings of the main house and one in the two-bedroom separate guest house. A few weeks into lockdown his (exhausted and staff-less) wife went on strike— from cooking, from him and the children. Even the Ocado orders arrived separately.
We have another friend who remained in London the entire first lockdown while his wife and young family went up to the country. At first we were all a bit miffed by the arrangement but this is now the “pin up” strategy for a second lockdown. “He keeps the housekeeper in London; she gets the nanny and the gardener,” says a mutual friend who is planning on doing the same. Nannies might have felt trapped the first time around but now they’ve wised up and know to ask for double their salary (it’s hard to recruit in a pandemic).
“A lot of alphas will be missing the long haul, luxury hotel, look-at-me lifestyle,” says Stefan Stern, a business writer and the co-author of Myths And Management. “So that also might tempt them into declaring that they have to be in the city, doing stuff. This will be a further test for relationships. As usual, the crisis will reveal which relationships were working well, or well enough, and which weren't."
“I’m simply not going through it again,” says my friend Sarah whose husband is a private wealth manager. “I’m moving to our chalet in Switzerland and coming back when it’s over.” Her husband is able to work in Geneva during the week which means no fighting over who gets the office or the wifi. Another friend says she has the Netjet on standby to disappear to Sicily where there is no shortage of space, sun or staff. Their children are at university and currently banned from coming home.
Another post lockdown trend is the bedroom make-over. Many bankers and financiers found themselves cradling their laptops trying to look professional whilst surrounded by chintzy cushions and Colefax and Fowler buttoned headboards (chosen by the decorator). Meanwhile their wife, children and staff were spread out across the rest of the house.
Stephanie Betts, a former lawyer who founded Josephine Home, purveyor of exquisitely silky sheets for high-end interiors, says those who have decided to work in a bedroom are rapidly turning them into the equivalent of a suite at the Four Seasons. This is why the ‘homeware’ category has been booming in the US, she says. “Everyone knows we might need to continue to hunker down and home is where we are meant to feel safe, cosseted. This is where bankers and others will want to up the game for their bedroom sanctuary, or ‘boffice’”.
Speaking as someone whose husband took over her London office and now works in a “boffice” upstairs, thread count matters. So does having a Nespresso machine nearby, and your own portable wifi booster (to avoid Zoom wars).
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