Sleeping where I worked blurred my work-life boundaries Ever since I was a kid, I?ve had a fantasy of sleeping in a tiny space, a cozy chamber just big enough to curl up in. I never imagined that the fulfillment of that fantasy would take place not in a romantic boxcar or a cupboard under the stairs, but in a bustling Tokyo office.
I used to live in Japan, so when a friend who makes an independent newspaper from a different city each month decided to do an issue on Tokyo, she hired me to contribute my childish Japanese and knowledge of where it?s okay to wear shoes. Our collaborators at Midori.so, a Tokyo network of coworking spaces, offered to put us up; the fact that we would be sleeping in the middle of its office got lost in translation. I arrived before everyone else, dazed from the 15-hour flight. With an app, I unlocked the door to an open-plan office that took up the entire floor: glass-walled meeting rooms, floor-to-exposed-ceiling windows, and mismatched (but color-storied) tables, chairs, and sofas. Someone had left a note: Your beds are in the library. They meant ?in?: sleeping nooks concealed within bookshelves, boxes slightly smaller than a twin mattress and just tall enough to sit up in, with suede curtains for privacy. I crawled in and passed out.

Cool offices around the world have incorporated nap zones and meditation rooms, but Midori.so?s beds are also intended for commuters who work late. They fit right in with urban Japan?s prolif...