We have been living in a co-op in Silicon Valley for roughly a week. In fact, a number of homes and vacant spaces in the Bay Area are beginning to be occupied by large groups of people, creating a new type of “commune” in the Digital Age. The Rainbow Mansion, where we currently live, is a collective of 11 young professionals from a wide range of careers. Brought together by a shared passion of entrepreneurship and innovation, these people have a common mission to bring extraordinary people under one roof to live, work, and change the world together. The contemporary collectives in the Bay Area are passionate about the belief that cohousing offers a socially responsible, environmentally friendly, creatively stimulating, and personally meaningful alternative lifestyle. They share groceries and household responsibilities, host events for the surrounding community, and embrace a lifestyle with little distinction between work and play.
The Rainbow Mansion was founded by Jessy Kate Schingler, a young engineer working at NASA’s Ames Research Center. It has now housed over 60 people from 12 countries. Inspired entrepreneurialism is a central facet: residents are carefully chosen for their ideas and ambitions, and they are often working on individual projects. The house regularly hosts events for the community in order to facilitate open political discussions and create a space for people to present projects and research for feedback. Current residents include Mike Grace and Diana Gentry, who are to be married in late August. Both Grace and Gentry work in NASA’s Ames Research Center. Molly Newborn, originally from Montreal, is an independent biotech investment consultant. Rainbow is also home to Google programmer Loredana Afanasiev, who is originally from a village in Moldova. Resident and entrepreneur Daniel Faber recently moved his company, Deep Space Technologies, which mines astroids, from the mansion’s garage to NASA’s research center. Principle engineer Shevek and entrepreneur Chris McCann also inhabit the large home. The last permanent resident is Andrea Malave, who currently works in childcare management at Stanford University. The house also has a guest room that can host up to 5 additional residents including Glen Tona, an Albanian software engineer working for IBM, and Johannes, a software engineer from Germany. We have been staying in the guest room with Glen and Johannes, and another woman is arriving on the 20th!
Last night we had a large “family dinner” (these dinners occur every Sunday), in which several guests, including past residents and potential future residents, all came over to enjoy a meal and after dinner hike with us. Several students who intern for Mike at NASA also came over. It’s hard to imagine that one family could live in a house that so comfortably fits so many people!