Sara Frisk never thought about traveling to Mexico City until a stranger named Pilar Muñoz invited her. Ms. Muñoz, a publicist for designers, lives in a 4,300-square-foot penthouse apartment with glass walls and luscious green views. The home has richly grained wood floors, trim modern sofas and a kitchen island you could sacrifice an ox on.
萨拉·弗里斯克(Sara Frisk)从没想过去墨西哥城,直到一个叫皮拉尔·穆尼奥斯(Pilar Muñoz)的陌生人邀请了她。穆尼奥斯是一名为设计师服务的公关人员,居住在一套4300平方英尺(约合399平方米)的顶层公寓中。这套公寓里有玻璃墙,坐拥令人舒心的绿色景观,铺设着纹理丰富的木地板,配备了精致现代的沙发,还有一个厨房岛台,你甚至可以在上面献祭一头公牛。
“If I was going to Mexico, I wanted to be on the water, but that house is completely amazing,” said Ms. Frisk, a graphic designer and design consultant in the West Town neighborhood of Chicago.
“我要是去墨西哥的话,就想去水上玩,但是那套房子太惊艳了。”弗里斯克说。她是一名平面设计师兼设计顾问,住在芝加哥的西镇(West Town)社区。
She had lost her heart on Behomm, an 18-month-old home-exchange website that has the comeliness of a shelter magazine, with one big difference: Viewers don’t just drool over beautiful properties; they stay in them.
她已经迷上了住宅交换网站——Behomm。该网站已有18个月的历史,和家居杂志一样充斥着精美的图片,但又与杂志有一个重大区别:访客不只是对着美宅流口水;他们还可以入住其中。
Ms. Frisk had planned to travel over Thanksgiving and couldn’t make the timing work for the Mexico City dream loft (she ended up in the Berlin abode of two architects). Now she’s trying to arrange to stay there with a group of friends.
弗里斯克本打算在感恩节出门旅行,但是匀不出时间去墨西哥城的梦幻之屋了 (结果她入住了两位建筑师在柏林的住所)。现在,她正试图组织一帮朋友跟她一起住到那去。
“It feels a lot more spontaneous planning a vacation around the home than doing all the research about where you want to go,” she said.
“我觉得,以住处为中心来计划旅行,比漫无目的地研究自己想去哪儿要自然多了。”她说。
Like other home-swapping sites, Behomm (pronounced “be HOME”) allows its members to trade properties, simultaneously or at different times. No money changes hands, as with Airbnb. The conditions for bartering are worked out in advance, and the reciprocal arrangement helps visits run smoothly.
和其他住宅交换网站一样,Behomm(发音为“be HOME”,寓意宾至如归)允许会员交换房屋,无论是同时还是错时。在此过程中没有金钱易手,就和Airbnb的模式一样。以物易物的条件已经预先制定,而互惠互利的安排有助于创造良好的入住体验。
Arriving at their destination, guests may find wine chilling in the refrigerator, a car at their disposal and a pet waiting to be fed. The principle is mutually assured protection: Do unto another’s B&B Italia sofa as you would have someone do unto yours.
到达目的地以后,客人可能会发现酒水已经放入冰箱冰镇,有一辆汽车可供使用,有一只宠物嗷嗷待哺。交换住宅的原则是基于共识的保护:你要爱护别人家的B&B Italia(意大利家具品牌——译注)沙发,正如你希望别人爱护你家中的物品一样。
What makes Behomm different (and a likely harbinger of home-exchange sites to come) is its peer-to-peer network. All its members are visual artists, designers or allied professionals. To join, they must work in one of 98 creative disciplines listed on the application, from animator to window dresser.
Behomm的与众不同之处在于它的同类人圈子(这或许代表着住宅交换网站未来的发展趋势)。所有会员都是视觉艺术工作者、设计师或同类的专业人士。要想加入会员,申请者的职业必须在网站列出的98个创新门类之内,包括动画师、橱窗设计师等等。
And they must have a great-looking place. The landing page at behomm.com features, among other beauties, a fashion designer’s Danish beach cottage, a photographer’s 1920s Milanese flat and an architect couple’s rustic (but not really) house in the Iron Horse neighborhood of Tucson.
而且,申请者必须拥有一个漂亮的住处。在behomm.com的登录页面上,该网站主打的特色美宅包括:一位时装设计师在丹麦海边的小木屋、一位摄影师在米兰的上世纪20年代公寓,以及一对建筑师夫妇在图森(Tucson)铁马(Iron Horse)社区的原木(并非真木)住宅。
Given the expertise of Behomm’s members, such stylishness is almost a foregone conclusion. Or so the founders believe.
鉴于Behomm会员所具备的专业素养,他们能提供如此有品味的住宅,几乎也是必然的结果。或者说,网站的创始人就是这么认为的。
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Behomm was created by Eva Calduch and Agust Juste, both 48-year-old graphic designers in Barcelona, Spain. The couple, longtime home exchangers, had become tired of slogging through the tens of thousands of entries on popular sites like HomeExchange.com.
Behomm的创始人是伊娃·卡尔杜奇(Eva Calduch)和奥古斯特·胡斯特(Agust Juste)都是西班牙巴塞罗那的平面设计师,现年48岁。这对夫妻长期以来经常与人交换住房,他们厌倦了在HomeExchange.com这类大众网站上,从成千上万的房源里大海捞针。
“We were wasting hours and hours,” Ms. Calduch said. Then one day they found an architect’s stunning apartment overlooking a seaport on the Balearic island of Minorca and realized that they ought to concentrate on the residences of their peers.
“我们浪费了大把的时间,”卡尔杜奇说。后来有一天,他们从一位建筑师那里发现了一套令人惊艳的公寓,从屋里就可俯瞰巴利阿里群岛(Balearic island)的米诺卡岛(Minorca)上的一个海港。由此,他们意识到,以后应该专门从同行那里寻找住处。
They began swapping with landscape architects, photographers and interior designers, and a network started, one that became the foundation of Behomm.
他们开始与景观设计师、摄影师和室内设计师交换房屋,一个网络渐渐成型,为Behomm打下了基础。
The first 300 people to join were offered free lifetime memberships (like many home-exchange sites, Behomm charges annual dues). Even now, new members have a year’s free trial before they pay a fee of 95 euros (about $113).
前300名加入会员的人,都被免费授予了终身会员资格(和许多住宅交换网站一样,Behomm也收取年费)。即使是现在,新会员也有为期一年的免费试用期,试用期满后便需支付95欧元(约合113美元,人民币702元)的费用了。
The site has some 1,200 members, with Spain and the United States supplying the most — about 200 each. The locations are as far-flung as Bali and Florianópolis, Brazil. Even Japan has four subscribers. (A remarkable number, Ms. Calduch said, considering that a Japanese colleague told her, “We don’t even invite friends over.”)
Behomm网站大约有1200名会员,其中以西班牙和美国的会员为主——两国人数均为200人左右。用户的分布远至巴厘岛和巴西的弗洛里亚诺波利斯(Florianópolis)。就连日本也有四位用户(卡尔杜奇说,这个数字很可观,毕竟,一位日本同事曾经告诉她,“我们甚至连朋友都不邀请过来住的。”)。
Around 10 to 20 percent of applications are rejected, often because the homes are shown to be messy or dirty. As for the rest, choices are based on “subjective aesthetics,” in Ms. Calduch’s words. Those decisions have nothing to do with size or luxury, she added: “A tiny place with very little can be nicer or more tasteful than a castle.”
大约有10%到20%的申请会遭到拒绝,这往往是因为申请者展示的住宅显得脏乱。至于其他原因,用卡尔杜奇的话说,取舍标准是基于“主观美学”,与房子的大小或豪华程度无关。卡尔杜奇还说:“朴实的弹丸之地也可能比一座城堡更好、更有品味。”
Nathalie Golliet, a designer in Paris who organizes culinary events, was one of the first to join. “I remember well, because I have the number 26,” she said.
巴黎设计师娜塔莉·戈列(Nathalie Golliet)经常筹办美食活动,她是第一批加入的会员。 “我记得很清楚,因为我的编号是26号。”她说。
She has made four swaps since becoming a member, including one in Marrakesh, Morocco, with Françoise Lefebvre, who shares her interest in food.
自从成为会员后,她交换过四次房子,其中有一次换到了位于摩洛哥马拉喀什(Marrakesh)的房子,业主是弗朗索瓦·列斐伏尔(Françoise Lefebvre),她和戈列一样对美食感兴趣。
Each woman was impressed with the other’s well-equipped kitchen. Ms. Golliet even learned how to prepare Moroccan dishes from a cook Ms. Lefebvre sent over while Ms. Golliet was staying at her house.
两个人都对彼此设备齐全的厨房印象颇深。戈列甚至从列斐伏尔派来照顾她起居的厨师那里,学会了如何烹制摩洛哥菜。
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Behomm is not the only home-exchange network to streamline its membership. A site called Seniors Home Exchange is limited to people older than 50. The rationale is that this age group isn’t hampered by school-age children with disruptive vacation schedules. What’s more, the site insists, “Our experience has been that mature people tend to take better care of things when they are not theirs.”
Behomm并不是唯一一个给会员设立门槛的住宅交换网站。一个名为“老人住宅交换”(Seniors Home Exchange)的网站将会员年龄限定在50岁以上。理由是,这个年龄段的人不会被学龄儿童混乱的假期安排所困扰。更重要的是,该网站坚持认为,“依照我们的经验,成熟人士更懂得爱护别人的东西。”
Trust is fundamental to home exchange, and it is easier to come by in small communities with common interests.
在住宅交换的问题上,信任是至关重要的。志同道合的小群体更容易达成信任。
Arun Sundararajan, a professor at the Stern School of Business at N.Y.U., who researches the digital sharing economy, said social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn, and tools that verify one’s real-life identity, now allow us to vouch for a person’s credibility and good intentions.
阿伦·孙达拉拉詹(Arun Sundararajan)是纽约大学斯特恩商学院(Stern School of Business)的教授,研究数字共享经济。他说,如今,Facebook和领英(LinkedIn)这类社交媒体平台,以及一些验证个人真实身份的工具,都能够让我们为一个人的信誉和善意担保。
Trust can be cultivated even in high-stakes situations like “letting a stranger into your bedroom,” he said, or in the case of long-distance ride-sharing programs like carpooling.com, “letting a stranger drive you to a strange city.” This makes the time ripe for a peer-to-peer home-swapping venture that draws new people in.
孙达拉拉詹说,信任是可以培养的,即使在高风险的情况下,比如“让陌生人进入你的卧室”,或是像carpooling.com这类长途搭车项目,“让一个陌生人开车送你去一个陌生的城市”。这就促使了创建同类人群住宅交换项目的时机成熟,吸引着新人的加入。
For their part, Behomm’s members spoke of the comfort they found in their intimate network, the novelty of stepping into one another’s shoes and the value of acquaintances that bloom into friendships or business opportunities.
就Behomm的会员而言,他们谈及自己在这个亲密的小圈子里体会到的舒服自在;还有住在他人家中体会到的新奇感;以及从与人结交中发展出来的友谊或业务机遇。
“It goes way beyond sharing a home — you share your lives,” said Alex Trochut, a graphic designer and illustrator who lives in New York and Barcelona. Mr. Trochut described the Behomm experience as the “very opposite of Airbnbn, because you feel entitled to things when you pay for them. This is about giving and not receiving.”
“这远非共享住宅那么简单——你还分享了自己的生活经历,”亚历克斯·特罗许(Alex Trochut)说。特罗许是一名平面设计师、插画师,现居纽约和巴塞罗那。他表示,Behomm给人的体验和Airbnb“截然相反,因为如果一样东西是需要付钱的,你就会觉得这是自己应得的。而在Behomm,你所做的就是不计回报地给予。”
Can it really be that good? Ms. Calduch said that she has refereed only two small conflicts in the last year and a half. One involved cleaning. “There was a misunderstanding,” she recalled. The other had to do with confusion over which of a member’s multiple homes was being offered.
Behomm真的有他说的那么好吗?卡尔杜奇说,在这一年半里,她只调解过两次小矛盾。其中一次事关房屋的清洁问题。“他们之间有些小误会。”她回忆道。另一次的起因是,其中一方搞不清楚对方与他交换的是哪套住宅(对方有多套住宅)。
To fend off squabbles, she supplies forms that allow users to specify all the terms for an exchange, including stipulations for purging cat hair and sharing toys. Still, conversations with some Behomm members suggested ample room for dispute.
为避免纷争,她提供了表格,让用户列明某次交换的全部条件,包括清理猫毛和分享玩具的具体规定。尽管如此,通过采访一些Behomm会员我们发现,产生分歧的机会还是很多。
For instance, Wendy Rommers and her husband, Bas van Schelven, often swap their primary residence near Amsterdam, which is a houseboat.
举个例子,温迪·罗默斯(Wendy Rommers)和丈夫巴斯·凡·谢尔万(Bas van Schelven)经常交换他们靠近阿姆斯特丹的主要居住地,那是一座船屋。
Ms. Rommers, who is a multidisciplinary designer (Mr. van Schelven owns the company that makes the boats), said that the vessel doesn’t have particular maintenance needs, though she advises keeping the water running on freezing nights. As for safety, there are life jackets, “and things you can throw into the water” that a drowning person might grasp. She made no mention of liability insurance.
罗默斯是一位跨领域的设计师(而凡·谢尔万掌管着一家造船公司),她表示,这艘船并没有特别的维护需求,只不过她建议,在严寒的夜里要保持水的流动状态。至于安全问题,屋里备有救生衣,“还有一些可以扔到水里的东西”,以供溺水者抓住。她没有提到责任保险。
Indeed, one of the few negative anecdotes came from Mr. Trochut, and he was the cause of havoc. While he and a girlfriend were staying in Copenhagen in 2008, his companion had an asthma attack that put her in the hospital.
事实上,在Behomm屈指可数的几件负面轶事中,有一件的当事人就是特罗许,而且,他还是罪魁祸首。2008年,他和一位女朋友在哥本哈根逗留期间,他的同伴因哮喘发作住了院。
His hosts were so helpful in advising the couple on medical care that Mr. Trochut decided to repay them by washing the bed linens. Eager to finish before they returned home, he set the washer at the highest speed, which produced vibrations that caused the machine to tumble onto the adjacent bathroom sink, crushing the perfume bottles lined up there.
他的房东为两人就医提供了很大帮助,特罗许决定清洗亚麻床单来报答他们。由于急于在房东归来前完成洗涤,他将洗衣机的转速设在了最高档,谁知由于振动太猛,机器翻倒在旁边的浴室盥洗池上,将那里一字排开的香水瓶击碎了。
Mr. Trochut discovered the carnage just as his hosts walked in. “We got to an agreement,” he said. “I paid for everything.”
特罗许在发现这一惨状时,房东刚好进门。“我们达成一个协议,”他说,“东西都由我赔。”