The Writers Room, which calls itself “The nation’s oldest and largest urban writers’ colony,” was founded in 1978 by a group of downtown writers wanting to create a quiet, conducive space in which to coax the muses. The Room is currently located (after occupying three other Village addresses in its first twenty-five years) in a large, airy loft space on historic Astor Place.
Donna Brodie, Director of The Writers Room since 1994, recognizes its unique place in the lives of city writers: “We have a few members who were here from our humble beginnings in a tiny office with four desks. They are passionately attached to The Writers Room. But so are the people who just became members last week. Everyone who joins the Room asks, “Where have you been all my life?”
The Writers Room is bright, well maintained, and virtually silent apart from the muted clickety-clack of fingers on keyboards. It has large windows facing north and west, with dramatic views of the Empire State Building. It even includes a separate, “talk quietly” kitchen and eating area, as well as a secluded napping room and lounge nooks (must be true about writers daydreaming a lot).
Available to writers of all genres, members have access every day of the year, twenty-four hours a day. The membership fees are also affordable—about $1800 a year—thanks to the financial backing of longtime supporters and private grants.
The Writers Room seems to give writers both structure and a sense of belonging. As one member put it: “I used to waste time at home checking Facebook and calling friends. Now I’m in the company of other writers, in a professional setting, and I get a lot more accomplished. The room gives me all of the solitude I need with none of the isolation.”
Currently, The Writers Room has more than two hundred members sharing forty-two partitioned desks. But the varying schedules of members (including some who only use the room at night) allow everyone to find an available workspace.
A lot of impressive work is produced here. In the past year, members have published twenty-five fiction and non-fiction books (actor Alan Cummings recently finished his memoir here), in addition to major pieces in magazines and journals. Since it opened over thirty-five years ago, more than one thousand books have been written in the room. That’s a lot of plot twists.
Brodie adds, “When aspiring writers have tried everywhere else—the kitchen table, the cafe crowded with app developers, the annual retreat to a woodsy cabin—The Writers Room is the place where they settle in for the long haul. It has been a home away from home for thousands of writers and a savior of marriages for almost as many.”
THE WRITERS ROOM
740 Broadway at Astor Place, 12th floor
http://www.writersroom.org 212.254.6995
Allan Ishac is the author of New York’s 50 Best Places to Find Peace and Quiet and creator of the TranquiliCity app. He lives in Greenwich Village. (http://www.allanishac.com)
