There will be a new place in Lisbon for creative people to come together: it's called Second Home and the name says it all. It was designed to allow people to share ideas and itâs open to collaboration. It will be in the iconic building of Mercado da Ribeira and it will have more than a thousand plants.
Last May we met the founder of Second Home, Rohan Silva, in the gardens of Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, in Lisbon. This is a space with a wide variety of trees and plants and it seemed the perfect place to interview Rohan, also because it's a meeting point of cultures and ideals in the city, which is something that Rohan aims to be one of the main goals of Second Home.
WHAT IS SECOND HOME? Check the video.
Tell us a little bit about who are you, what have you done, your pastâŚ
My name is Rohan Silva, Iâam the co-founder of Second Home - a creative venue and a creative work space out of London but coming to Lisbon very soon.
Before I started Second Home with a great co-founder, I was a technology adviser to the British Prime Minister and I worked there as a policy for the British government from the environment to international development, from education to the economy, but itâs wonderful now being an entrepreneur myself and working very hard to support lots of other entrepreneurs.
Itâs amazing because you are so young but at the same time you have so much experience and a great vision about what you want and what you think itâs important for your projects. Where the motivation comes from?
Back in 2010, I was working for the British Prime Minister, I started an initiative called Tech City and it was a government project designed to support a digital technology cluster in East London and when we started this initiative there were maybe 200 digital companies in East London. Today, they are over 10.000. That got me addicted to thinking about how cities and buildings can support creativity, entrepreneurship, innovation, job creation⌠So, so much of that motivation really came by accident, because I had no idea Tech City would be so successful and it has really shaped a lot of my career ever sense. I think being opened to accident and to serendipity is a very important thing.
WHERE WILL SECOND HOME LISBOA BE? Check the video.
We know that you have Amazon, Google, start-ups, ideas and everything together in the same space. Tell us a little bit about some projects and about this idea of collaboration in Second Home.
Second Home is based on a very simple belief that I have that is: âGreat things happen and innovation happens, when different industries, different types of company, companies of different sizes and stages colideâ. So, we have artists and writers alongside some of the biggest companies in the world. We have people working in fashion, design, filmmaking, but also very cutting edge technology and virtual reality. That, to me, is very exciting and so many collaborations happen as a result. A great example is the designer Thomas Heatherwick who designed the Olympic Cauldron in the 2012 Olympics. We introduced him to one of the members of Second Home. These members of the company are filmmakers, but they make films for Oculus Rift, the virtual reality technology. Thomas Heatherwick was bidding to design a huge building in NY and he was introduced to them by us to this filmmaking company and he commissioned them to make a virtual reality film of a building he was proposing and, because of that virtual reality film, he won that bid, because the judges were able to imagine what the building would be like. That kind of collaboration happens every day at Second Home and itâs because of this curation, because we choose very carefully different people, different industries and then mix everyone up.
You have already spoken about the philosophy of Second Home and this idea of collaboration, but tell us a bit about the building. How was the architectural project?
The former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill once said: âFirst we shape our buildings and then they shape usâ. I really believe that, so, every aspect of Second Home in London and soon in Lisbon is designed to support the things we care about: the collision and the interaction between different people. I think so often our cities and our buildings isolate us and separate us. Second Home is designed in a way that you are constantly bumping into people. You can see what everyone else is doing, but you also have private space and thatâs very important.
So, thatâs a big  part of the architecture. Another part of the architecture is the way we bring in board nature. We have so many plants and trees! There isnât a single straight line of Second Home because in nature there are no straight lines. We also embrace the kind of complexity you have in nature. If you think about the leaves on a tree, every single leaf is different. At Second Home every chair and every desk lamp is different, too. So, by harnessing these insights from nature in our architecture, we think we can really create spaces that support well being, creativity, productivity, innovation - all the good things, really. Thatâs what Second Home is about.
WHAT IS THE GOAL OF SECOND HOME? Check the video.
Creativity in industries are really important for this kind of work and proposal. But what do you think itâs the most important thing for having creativity in the community and in a city like Lisbon? What kind of clues you can give us about the projects that are going to be presented?
I think itâs something very important about place and space. Itâs a paradox, really, because technology is obliterating distance. Theoretically, we can work with anyone anywhere. We could all be living in a countryside collaborating by Skype and email, but thatâs not what we do. We increasingly come to urban centers like Lisbon and  London, to talk, to collaborate, to colide and thatâs really where innovation happens. So, what I think it is really important is to create these physical hubs, places like Second Home, where real innovation can happen. We think we need to do three things to Second Home, always: the first is to have architecture that supports those kinds of collisions and creativity, the second is to curate the community very carefully - see you have that diversity, not just text start ups or not just artists or fashion designers, but all of those and big companies, small ones, and so on - and the third thing thatâs really important to us is cultural programming - having inspiring speakers, live music and film screenings. We need to expose people to ideas and provocations that they may not came across. So, in London, for example, weâve had Sir Richard Branson talking, Stella McCartney - the fashion designer - talking about ethical business, weâve had Annie Lennox - the singer - talking about womenâs rights, weâve had the astronomer royal Lord Martin Rees talking about his theory of multiple universes. Whatâs great about that is that you might be a graphic designer or you might work for a big bank, but youâre hearing ideas that might spark a thought that causes you to think in a different way, and the great thing about Second Home is that youâre around people that you can end build a company with or build a product. Wherever you want to do with that creative idea you find support within the community and thatâs very important.
Nowadays we are so connected to the social networks. Itâs a kind of a live community where you can share so many things. Tell us a bit about the collaboration with Village Underground.
I really believe in eco-systems, I believe in community very strongly, I believe that⌠Thatâs why I love cities! Because we can achieve things in cities together that we canât achieve by ourselves. So, Second Home in London, like in Lisbon, is very much part of a community. We are very open. People can come in, can connect and can come to our events and we always, as well, try to partner with people that we share their values.
Village Underground, to me, is really a very important place in London and Lisbon. Itâs a space for artists, for creative people and I think itâs very complementary with Second Home. So, itâs a real pleasure to be working with Village Underground in Lisbon because I think we both want the same thing, which is, for our cities to be more creative, more fun, more productive and, ultimately, for more creative people to have the chance to follow their dreams, and to really flourish in the 21st century.
An entrepreneur is at the same time a kind of an artist. You have to think about things, to challenge yourself, to innovate⌠What is for you, as an entrepreneur, the big challenge?
Steve Jobs talked a lot about entrepreneurship as a creative artistic expression and I really agree with that. I think there is something very beautiful about imagining something and bringing into being and Second Home is about trying to make that as easy and frictionless as possible. The truth is: entrepreneurship is very hard. Itâs hard to recruit great people, to find the investments, the partners you need to grow⌠Second Home is all about helping entrepreneurs do those things. The way we choose our members, the companies, the teams at Second Home is partially by thinking: âOk, what do you need as you grow your company?â. So, we always have investors, graphic designers, PR agencies, recruiters, education providers⌠Because you might need any of those things as you grow. Because I believe in entrepreneurship, I believe there is trade and exchange that we can perfect one another and so, as you grow your company, Second Home or in the neighborhood, you will find, hopefully, everyone that you need as you grow within our community. Itâs really because I know the challenges of being an entrepreneur that weâve organized Second Home in the way we do and I really think it makes a huge⌠If you look in London, you see companies in Second Home going from 4 people to 30 people in 12 months. Thatâs really in part because of that environment and that community that we have created.
About the project in Lisbon, you were telling us a very funny thing about the tables. Tell us how is going to be the space?
Second Home in Lisbon is gonna be like nowhere else in the world, let alone in this great city. Itâs gonna be a place that is full of creative people working day and night, different types of industries and big companies and small. You gonna have two parts of second home: you gonna have this very beautiful bookshop cafe bar full of talks and music performances, reading and art performances - a great place to relax, to meet people, to discover new ideas; and also a very beautiful workspace. Everything we do at Second Home involves the thinking about sustainability and the environment. So, our space in Lisbon is gonna be, I think, one of the greenest buildings in all Europe. One of the ways we are doing that is by not using traditional air conditioning, which is very bad for the environment, but instead using natural ventilation - windows that open - but also to cool the building and heat the space we are gonna be having a huge table with almost 100 meters long, and running through this table, will be a water pipe, almost like a water hose that you water your garden with. Will be built into the table itself and in Summer, when itâs hot, we will be pumping very cold water through that table, through the hose and the table. So, the table itself will act as a cooling device. In Winter, we will pump hot water through the pipe warming the table and the room, and itâs a very energy efficient way of heating and cooling a space, itâs very good for the environment, but itâs also very simple. I think part of the truth of second home is that we are actually quite an old fashion company. We are supporting 21st century innovation, but at the heart of what we do we are about learning from nature - which is much older than we are - and itâs about trying to help people to do something very old fashion, which is get together, talk, be present, be mindful and create together. In Lisbon we gonna be doing that in a way that I think is never being done before.
I think that there are many people that donât have the idea or donât know the importance of creative industries in our daily lives. Tell us a bit about that.
There is really been a big change in London and the UK over the pasts 5 years. It use to be the case the creative industries and technology are seeing as not that important. Today, the creative industries in London employ more people than work in banking and financial services. I think the same would be true in Lisbon in the years ahead because if you think about technology, as it advances, itâs replacing more and more human jobs. In the 1980âs and 1990âs it replaces jobs in manufacturing. Today is replacing jobs in what we call âwhite collarâ industries like accounting, banking, the law⌠Software is replacing many of these jobs. So, whatâs left for us humans to do? What are we really good at and computers are bad at? At the moment, is creativity. So, Second Home and indeed a city like Lisbon are all about creativity and thatâs where high valuable jobs are gonna come for in the future. I think itâs also where the jobs that create the most happiness often come, as well. I think we are going to see a big change and in the time I have been in Lisbon, Iâve been talking to the Mayor, the secretary of the State for Industry⌠You have great leadership here and these are leaders who really understand the importance of the creative industries and technology. Second Home, of course, will also have energy companies, will have financial services as well because itâs by colliding them all these together that real creativity happens. I canât wait to see what unexpected collaborations, new jobs and businesses happen at Second Home, happen in Lisbon as a result of that.
How did you discover that you wanted to have a project like this?
Before I started Second Home I was a technology adviser to the British Prime Minister. I was very lucky to work in all areas of government policy, but i was always really passionate, most passionate, about entrepreneurship, innovation, technology - those are the fun  bits, to be honest. There also the new things that are changing our economy and society. So, when I left the government to start a business it was very logical to think about a business that was about that same mission: about supporting these goals that I care about. Second Home is all about that. Itâs about asking the question: âWhere the new creative jobs gonna come from?â and âHow can we support innovation in cities like London and Lisbon?â. We do that through our buildings, through our community, through our cultural programming and itâs so much fun everyday! Government was great but it was also quite slow at times and the lovely thing about being an entrepreneur is everyday is different. You can wake up one morning and say: âYou know what? Letâs go to Lisbon and make this project happenâ, and meet great people, the city is responding in the most amazing way and thatâs what life is all about. I just hope that for the entrepreneurs that are going to be based in Second Home their adventure can be as fun and hopefully successful as ours has been so far.
