THE PHILOSOPHY OF RADICAL INCONSISTENCY: AN INTERVIEW
RICHARD CHRISTIANSEN of FLAMINGO ESTATE as you've rarely, if ever, heard him: POLITICS, GAY VEGETABLES, ?ELITISM?
Dear Snoops,
We continue your visitation rights to FOR SCALE ISSUE 2 with absolutely the most important, no-holds-barred-adjacent interview with Richard Christiansen ever. He is (ofc you know) the founder of the famed FLAMINGO ESTATE.
The domestically-curious are WELL AWARE of THE FLAMINGO ESTATE, “a celebrity home” in that the home itself is the “celebrity”. It is RESIDENCE (lived in), BRAND (product range), and PHILOSOPHY (curious about how to “become alive ”— as suggests its major text, the book “THE GUIDE TO BECOMING ALIVE”), and it belongs to Richard C.
BACKGROUND: the F. Estate sort of “BECAME” at the onset of the pandemic — shifting Richard C.’s attention from advertising to the delivery of quite TOP TIER, bougie vegetable boxes. This led to HOMESCAPE PRODUCTERY: food stuff, soap stuff, et cetera. Admittedly the best “TOMATO” candle currently available; no offense to LOEWE.
SOME CRUCIAL QUOTES:
RICHARD C.: “In the early days I never really thought it was going to be much more than that.
Then it morphed into a very dishonest place. Let me explain…”
RICHARD C.: “We had this funny finance meeting—we were trying to raise some capital. I went to this, like, very bro-y DC firm at one point, and they were like, “Oh, who are you?” And, I was like “I own Flamingo Estate.” And he's like, “Oh, yeah, you're THE GUY THAT CREATED GAY VEGETABLES.”
RICHARD C.: “And I was curious about something you wrote [in some question you sent in advance] — you said the word elitist, that maybe we were elitist? I can't remember what the context was, exactly — but about costs. So before I spoke to you, I was like, “Oh, this sounds like this guy's a chip on his shoulder about money,” but tell me where that comes from…”
FOR SCALE: “THAT IS ABSOLUTELY HILARIOUS. Something to write on your gravestone.”
THIS PARTICULAR INTERVIEW: came about because of a sorta notorious-to-us Instagram post (which is revisited below). But the DISCUSSION IS VARIED: capitalism, selfishness, “radical inconsistency”, gay vegetables, artificial “intelligence”, elitism vs “elite”, AND OF COURSE, the relationship of all this to THE DOMESTIC SPHERE.
We reprint here because it’s REAL and INTERESTING and at moments we’re both borderline defensive? We are, genuinely, super grateful he let us ask the things we asked.
It is for “FOR SCALE XL” paid subscribers. Or you can find it in print.