o many things have happened since we founded Mutinerie, a project still in the early stage of life and yet growing fast. The founding mutineers’ crew have known each other for ever. Three brothers and a playground friend who’ve sailed the seven seas and decided, one day of September 2010, to start Mutinerie with one objective: gather a community of mutineers sharing the same values in a coworking space in Paris.
And we didn’t beat around the bush: Instead of holing up in a dimly lit cave to study our maps, we decided to go through the motions and chose to speak directly to the self-employed and entrepreneurs, as well as coworking pioneers, to devise, along with them, a strategic game place. What developed was beyond our expectations. The Jelly meeting that we threw in mid-January, 2011, enabled us to cross paths with awesome mutineers who changed the destiny of Mutinerie.
By this time, we also had the chance to discover the genuine power of Creative Commons and open data. Across the world, from Berlin to Milan, via London, New York, Seattle and San Francisco (but also Lille, Lyon, Dijon and Saint-Etienne) people were willing to share their knowledge and experience.
Finally, in Paris, we got to share ideas and meet with many people who contributed in turning Mutinerie into a successful project. We saw before our eyes the excitement growing around coworking projects in Paris, and we truly appreciated the support we got from Parisian coworkers like La Cantine, a path-breaking coworking space in France.
On the occasion of this 1st Mutine retrospective, we’d like to say how grateful we are to those who helped us and who foster, day after day, our belief that we are moving in the right direction.
In January, 2011, we launched this blog, a gateway to presenting and explaining our project and showing what we were made of. We are now thrilled to feed it and keep it up to date. We have received positive feedbacks , engaging in constructive dialogues and enhancing the general level of interaction.
In early February, 2011, the crew took over a first ship at 16 rue Oberkampf, Paris. A month later, some 20 mutineers had signed up to join the ranks of Mutinerie, and many others were about to ambush. Right away, we felt far-reaching affinities with most of the people who got in touch with us, the evidence that our message was appropriate and efficient (the self-selection process had been a success). But life is scattered with unexpected hurdles waiting to be overcome. In late February, a legal dispute between the owner and the tenant of the premises erupted, compelling our mutineers, poor sub-tenants and collateral victims, to abandon their noble vessel.
Nonetheless, it was obvious that the Mutinerie’s concept had legs, and the crew was motivated and strong as ever. Right away, we embarked on a search for a second and more ambitious space. Pirates used to sink their own ships in the heat of a battle, a necessary step to spark in them enough determination to step on board of the coveted vessel. And such was our state of mind; astray, but determined to seize a new vessel filled up with gold, gun powder and rum.
December 15, 2011 was the day we boarded of our new ship. Mutinerie opened its doors in early March, 2012, at 29 rue de Meaux, next to the subway stations of Colonel Fabien, Bolivar and Jaurès, and very near by the Canal Saint Martin and the Buttes Chaumont park.
We really enjoyed letting our imagination run wild to arrange this space, and we hope you will find happiness and good fortune there. You’ll have an amazing ship to go through the year 2012, a year that – according to the omens we got from octopus’ innards – should be very lively, with raging seas and gales. Thank you to all of you who gave us educated advice, who supported and inspired us and who enabled us to keep faith and a steady hand on the wheel.
If you are a self-employed, designer, developer, journalist, consultant, blogger, researcher, minstrel or pirate looking for a crew, if you think your freedom is precious yet still enjoy meeting new people from different backgrounds under no other pressure than that of a draft beer, then contact us or subscribe to our newsletter to keep up with Mutinerie’s latest news.
