about

Hi there! I'm Guy Koolhof. You can call me Guy. I've been sharing my guidance on small-space living in this weekly newsletter, Guy with an Eye, since June of 2021.

Let me tell you a story. Some years ago, when my government job switched from contract to full-time, I finally felt secure enough to begin a new project – searching for a condo. Morphing from renter to homeowner felt like the next logical step in my development, a sign of maturity, proof of more good things to come.

Exhilaration turned to dismay and then despair, once I started touring condos in my price range. The awkward layouts seemed to signal these were more speculative investments than spaces to be lived in, and the glaring evidence of slapdash construction was impossible to unsee.

While examining the balcony of an especially strange unit, its floor plan shaped like a piece of pie, I noticed something off about the concrete surface above me. Looking closer, I saw a construction worker's glove embedded in the material, dangling slightly like a piece of rotten fruit.

It felt like a warning: You're looking for something that is bound to disappoint you. I decided to take a step back and reconsider my next move.

I'd been living in a studio apartment for over eight years, in a low-rise building from the late 1950s. It had always seemed like a stepping stone to bigger and better things. Now I began to wonder: Is this my home from now on?

Once I gave the place a second look, I realized it was thoughtfully designed, solidly built, and full of potential. All I needed to do was shift my focus from an idealized future to the real parameters of the present moment.

I took it on as a challenge, as if I'd just moved into a place I owned. As I upgraded furniture, rethought colours, and rejigged space planning, something inside me changed. After almost a decade in this barely appreciated space, the long-postponed decision to actually stay made me realize – with relief – I was exactly where I was supposed to be.

I recognized that my home wasn't the static physical shell I was inhabiting. Instead, it was the set of carefully chosen things I populated it with, including the vintage treasures I enjoyed collecting. I started thinking of my furnishings as a kind of liquid architecture, always responding to my current ideas, outlook, and mood. Could this more more flexible dwelling be a kind of fluid self-portrait?

When the pandemic struck, my decision to stay took on a new intensity. Seemingly endless housebound hours gave me an appreciation for how even small adjustments in a room could bring about massive shifts in appearance and mood. Arranging and rearranging objects became my favourite pastime, a habit I eventually labelled "micro-decorating"...

That secure government job? It evaporated in the spring of 2021. Not only was it good I hadn't committed to a mortgage, it was good I'd taught myself how to find unexpected pleasure in the art of small-space living.

No matter what my next job turned out to be, I knew that a second one was waiting in the wings: sharing what I'd learned about creating a compact yet forever interesting home with anyone who cared to listen. This second job would be impervious to fickle employers, permanently my own.

The first Guy with an Eye article appeared on June 12, 2021, and the first newsletter went out a few days later. In this early period, I wasn't sure how long I'd be able to write about a topic whose basic premise was smallness and limitation. Now, five years and over 200 issues later, I'm convinced that our exploration together has just started.

If you're still searching for your "forever home," Guy with an Eye is for you. If you're struggling with an impossibly small apartment, Guy with an Eye is on your side. If you're itching to make your environment a unique expression of who you are. Guy with an Eye has your back.

We micro-decorators are a wily, optimistic bunch. Come join us.