My NON-Minimalist Philadelphia Apartment Tour7 min read

I love my apartment; I think I have finally maximized the space. There are two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a living room and kitchen combo. Let’s start with the entryway.

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Entry Way

This little mirror on the left here from CB2 is lovely because you can see if you look ridiculous right before you leave.

I have three photos that I particularly like on the right, the top two are from a trip I took to Croatia, and the third one is of my old dog.

Two more big paintings on the right here. I know this is a famous one, but I just liked how it is morning time and nighttime in the picture. The large one I took from my parent’s old house.

Kitchen

The first thing to point out is the island. This is one of the reasons I picked this apartment; I love cooking, and having a huge flat surface makes cooking and organizing ingredients so much easier.

Everything else here was the same as when I moved into the apartment. The only new thing in the oven is the Miele…

As for coffee, I use the virtuoso grinder thingy and a Chemex. I just make the same coffee the same way every morning. I have one cup about two hours after I wake up every day with my breakfast. I have the same beans; I always just buy the whole beans from Amazon.

There isn’t much else to point out here in the kitchen; there’s an excellent old-fashioned Philadelphia picture that my brother got for me. Also, rice cookers are fantastic.

There is a secret room off to the side here, which is becoming my podcast studio; I’ll be showing you guys that real soon…

Living Room

Onto the place where I spend most of my time, the living room/area. I bought this bar cart for about $200 off Amazon a while ago, and it’s stuck with me since. I barely drink, so the alcohol I picked is 90% because I liked how the bottle looked or someone got it for me.

I have my Martin Guitar here, which I love; I mainly picked it because I couldn’t find a guitar that was this nice dark brown color.

Also, we are onto the first one of my plants, this is my longest-lasting plant, and I just repotted it into this bigger pot. The snake plant, or Dracaena trifasciata, is straightforward to take care of.

As for the artwork, I bought two prints from 1000 museums.com and then went to a local framing place to get framed.

This picture of the ocean was from CB2 as well.

My apartment has these lovely huge windows, and the ceiling is higher than most places, so I wanted to make the best use of them.

In one of the windows, I have my desk, which I have an entire post on here.

In the other window, I have my reading nook, which I will talk about later.

Next to my desk, I have this sofa from Ikea, another great thing that has lasted me a while.

I have the magical table where I eat 75% of the time. I also store my video game controllers here so people don’t know I play video games.

Below the TV, I have another CB2 console with excellent storage space. I have a bunch of junk on one side that I won’t even show you; on the other side, I have the Yamaha receiver, which all my speakers go through.

I have three awesome Klipsch speakers.

On top is just a standard TV. I think I bought the first 43″ TV I saw on Amazon, it might have been this one.

And on top of the counter, I have a record player and fancy chess set from CB2. My favorite records I have here are hasta la Ruiz, Kid a, and

Reading Nook

This has been the most recent addition to my apartment and has quickly become my favorite part of the apartment.

This window used to be an empty space where I put a big monster plant, but now it has a great purpose.

I know a fantastic woodworker who custom-built this reading nook to fit inside of the window space. We made it, so it was continuous with the window sill so that there was enough space for me to fully lay down on. The nook has a drawer and space for books.

Then, I had to get a custom cushion made to go on top of the wooden reading nook. On top of which, I put some blankets and some pillows to make it comfy.

I like plants if you can’t already tell, so I got some plants that hang and climb well: English ivy, two pothos plants, and this other plant which I forget the name.

Now, to the books, I went through about 7 “top 100 books of all time lists” and bought about 100 books. Every book here I have not read yet, but I want to read. On the left is fiction and on the right is non-fiction. The two books I am reading right now are Steve Jobs Biography and The Last Lecture.

Bedroom

Finally, the bedroom. Here I have my meditation station, a cool blanket from Filson, and a pillow that I sit on every morning.

The dresser is from CB2, and this other dresser was custom built by the same woodworker that built the reading nook. I have three more plants here a fig tree, a jade plant, and another one I forget the name of.

As for the artwork, I love Ansel Adams. This one is San Francisco before the bridge, and these are two other cool ones.

Then the bed, the only thing I want to point out is my mattress topper. The mattress topper is Pure Talalay Bliss 3″ Latex Mattress Topper. This mattress topper is excellent; it stays cool and is soft; I like a super soft bed.

Then I have the built-in washer/dryer, which is excellent, and an air purifier which I’m not even sure if it does anything; I have it constantly on auto.

Bathroom

The bathroom is pretty basic; I keep it rather minimalistic. It is nice to have a bath, I just bought some bulk bath salts, Johnson baby nighttime soap, and candles, and every Sunday night, I chill out before the week starts again.

And that’s pretty much it! I love this place, and after about three years of tinkering, I feel like I’ve got it exactly how I like it.

Thanks for reading! (picture below is under my desk – check out desk setup post here)