Jamie | The City as our Muse

New York is nothing like Paris; it is nothing like London; and it is not Spokane multiplied by sixty, or Detroit multiplied by four. It is by all odds the loftiest of cities. It even managed to reach the highest point in the sky at the lowest moment of the depression. - EB White 

Vayable first found a home in New York two years ago when a small community began sprouting up among some foodies, artists and city enthusiasts who began offering experiences on our platform.  We followed these intrepid early insiders to the city to meet with as many of them as we could. We hosted a late summer party at the rooftop of the Delancey with our friends at Airbnb and shared lunches, shopping trips and walks in the park with the people we met.  Within a few short weeks, New York surpassed San Francisco in bookings and number of insiders, and to this day, it continues to hold its position as the top U.S. destination on Vayable, which should come as no surprise. 

New York has not only been an incubator for the development of our product and business, but it’s also been an incubator of sorts for my own personal and professional development.  I spent my twenties in New York and in many ways have come to think of it as a second hometown. 

As we move into our third home as a Pop-up headquarters, we’ve learned to appreciate a new and important role the city has taken on in our business, that of the muse–inspiring and empowering creativity and growth in our vision, product and team.   San Francisco personifies the power of the network: we benefit daily from the people around us building new products, businesses and chasing lofty dreams. Vayable was born into it in a sense (I never moved to San Francisco to start a company, but rather happened to be there and benefit from it when I did) and it inspires us to be better and never limit our imagination.  Paris challenged us to look beyond money and toward connection as a primary motivator for community and our platform. It lifted the veil from parts of our business that had been broken and  covered by the niceties and blind enthusiasm that are distinctly San Franciscan.   

And now, New York.  

The night before we all departed to launch our Pop-up headquarters in New York City,I sent the following email to our team reminding them of important info  like our office location, schedule, contacts, and right below our goals, I included the following: 

Just for fun I added some of my favorite essays, should you elect to read them. 

Cities and Ambition by Paul Graham

http://www.paulgraham.com/cities.html

Goodbye to All That  by Joan Didion

http://theramblingqueen.blogspot.com/2013_04_01_archive.html

Here is New York by EB White

http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/shorts/white.html

A note on these essays: They’re meaningful and relevant to our Pop-Up HQ for several reasons.  The first one was emailed to me by my best friend back in 2007 and was the first time I was exposed to Paul Graham. I knew nothing about YCombinator, but the essay left a strong impact on me.  Since then I read it several times a year.  PG now tells me that the center of gravity for consumer technology companies has shifted from Silicon Valley to San Francisco.  I feel this frames the ideology and practical application behind the Vayable Pop-Up HQ concept. The Didion piece is my favorite essay of all time.  It not only communicates my own story of 7 years in NYC (and that of many, many others) but it is an exhibit of the evolution of consciousness and how one’s perception of a place is informed most profoundly by what takes place inside oneself.  This clearly has implications on our business and how we frame and deliver meaningful experiences and human connections.  Lastly, Here is New York is probably the most famous essay, and yet I only discovered it when I was in London in June in a conversation with a Londoner about our shared fondness for New York.  It’s supposedly the most quoted essay about New York. 

Each of these capture a central theme about a city’s power to inform, move and change people, and of course, the mutual effect people have on cities. If we think of Vayable as a kind of “global city” that we’re collectively (with travelers, insiders and our team) erecting, we should be thinking  of the impact it will have on everyone who inhabits it, as we have the power to have a transformative, lasting influence on people the way New York City has.

Building a community and product from around travel makes the city more than a classroom, but our muse, and we have a lot to learn from those who have come before us and experienced her creative force and inspiration.