People who live in London and don’t have living room are far more interesting

When you leave uni and look to move to London you have two options. You either move into a flat with a living room and pay way too much money for things you don’t need, or you get a series of rooms in a shitty ex council building and have the time of your life.

You can wait in your parents’ house for another couple of months, wait for Christmas to pass. Then think, oh shit it’s Easter and I need money for a holiday. You’ll delay your move date again, and again, and again. Then you’ll realise it’s been a whole year since you graduated and haven’t moved out yet. Your mum still does your laundry. Your mum still makes your lunches. And your mum still asks you what time your home for dinner. You can’t go to the pub on Thursdays without making sure you have your overnight bag to stay at a mate’s, or worse, at a colleagues.

Or, alternatively, you should just move out. Get a room with laminate flooring and white walls. Go on spare room, find a Frenchman and grab a few friends and move into the four bed flat in Hackney with one bathroom, one kitchen, one oven and one fridge and no living room.

Your flat, despite the lack of communal area, will become the sole focus of your friendship group. Because it’s so shit, you can host the most parties without fear of repercussions or losing your deposit. Because you live with more people, more interesting people, everyone wants to hang out with you at your flat.

You’ll end a night at 3am, and just when everyone is looking for the after party, there you are, with your big speakers in your room, and a labyrinth of bedside tables to rack up lines and a fridge full of beer and wine and prosecco. You’ll end up with scenes like these:

This is probably the only time the people without living rooms will be in their flat. Without somewhere to chill in their own home that isn’t their bedroom, they’ll always be out. They won’t be up to date on the latest TV, they won’t binge on Netflix. They’ll be strolling down Broadway Market, sipping a flat white in Brixton or on the third floor of Bussey Buildings offering you gum, they’re the people you aspire to be.

They’ve got more friends, friends who don’t have living rooms either. Dancers, DJs, members of Shoreditch House – they don’t need a living room.