For most of my life, the most interesting people I know have lived inside my laptop. Builders on the other side of the world. Musicians I've never heard play in person. Designers, coders and tinkerers who share their weird little projects at 2am and make the internet feel like a small town where everyone's making something.
And then you close the laptop, and the town disappears.
What if it didn't? What if the internet had a village, with real roofs, real gardens and a real table long enough for all of us?
The idea
Picture a small village somewhere in Europe. A few old stone houses that got some love. A barn turned into the nicest workspace you've ever had, with fast wifi and the doors wide open. Vegetable beds. An olive tree, or a pine forest, depending on where we end up. Chickens with opinions.
People come to stay for a few weeks, a season, or longer. They work on their own things: startups, albums, apps, paintings, films, AI tools, books, side projects that will never make money and don't need to. And then, in the evening, everyone puts their work down and sits at the same table.
What it shouldn't become
It isn't a luxury resort where you pay to be left alone. It isn't a corporate retreat with a facilitator and sticky notes. It isn't a productivity cult that wakes up at 4:30 to optimise its morning routine. And it isn't a hippie commune where you hand over your phone at the gate.
It's something in between. Independent people, living close enough to share a dinner and far enough to have their own front door.
What we believe
- Making things is joyful. Code, songs, soup, websites, furniture. It all counts.
- Technology can be warm. AI and the internet are tools for curiosity and connection, not just efficiency.
- Nature keeps us sane. Hands in the soil are a good antidote to tabs in the browser.
- Community beats networking. Friends, not contacts. Dinners, not events.
- Freedom over hustle. Work deeply, rest without guilt, enjoy being alive.
- Open, not exclusive. Curious, kind people from anywhere are welcome.
Why now?
More of us can work from anywhere than ever before. AI makes small teams and solo builders absurdly capable. And yet many of us feel lonelier and more scattered than ever. Remote work gave us freedom of place. Now we need places worth being free in.
How it starts
This isn't just a daydream. I've joined the Digital Nomad Village in Madeira and Tursi Digital Nomads in Italy several times, and each time I came home convinced that a small place full of curious people working side by side is something worth building on purpose.
Not with a big investment or a glossy render. It starts with people. With a list of names of folks who think this sounds like their kind of place. Then maybe a pop-up village for a month, to see what happens when we actually live together. Then, if it works, somewhere permanent.
The location, size, timeline and business model are all deliberately undecided. I'd rather figure them out with the people who'll live there than on my own.
If you've read this far, you might be one of them. Come say hello.
— A person with a laptop and a dream, somewhere in Europe
