We’re only as good as our stuff. Without quality equipment, we’re just a talking meat stick who brings shame to our family. This is especially true when it comes to our work environment. A poor home office is uncomfortable, inhibits our productivity, promotes clutter, saps our energy, and makes it easy for Karen to snake our promotion right out from under us. Conversely, an excellent workspace energizes us, streamlines our operation, and makes us more attractive to every gender. Therefore, to save you from a lifetime of loneliness, here’s the ultimate work from home setup.
Uplift Desk Uplift Standing Desk V2
If you’re only sitting at your desk like some lackadaisical 18th century aristocrat, you’re playing Russian roulette with your health. Desks that allow you to sit and stand keep your blood circulating which makes your heart a happy chappy. Uplift’s desks provide you with a glorious abundance of style choices, can fit anyone except NBA big men, and whip up and down so quickly they can keep up with your squat routine, assuming you’re not a serious crossfitter.
Roost V3 Laptop Stand
The Roost is a necessary accessory both for your home office and the office you take with you on trips to see your second family that you never talk about. It’s a slim, simple, portable way to elevate your laptop screen to eye level so as to avoid getting what the Frankenstein family calls “Igor syndrome.” It has seven height settings, and yet folds up smaller than a teacup poodle. Though you really shouldn’t fold those.
Grovemade Desk Shelf
Grovemade is the palladium standard when it comes to office gear, even when they’re making something as intricate and technical as a shelf. This provides a better way to organize your home office by taking your monitor to new heights atop a cork and walnut or maple support that allows you to hide documents, laptops, or incriminating photos underneath it. Supports monitors up to 50 pounds, so go ahead and get that tungsten screen you’ve always wanted.
Azio Retro Classic Bluetooth Keyboard
When you’re a devoted hipster who wants to do everything by typewriter, but your work necessitates use of this “internet” fad that everyone’s been on about, the Retro Classic gives you a way to split the difference. It’s made with a typewriter feel, but is fully Bluetooth capable, has a backlit mechanical keyboard, a leather or wood surface, and a metal alloy frame so vintage that you’ll want to wear it to your next steampunk cosplay event.
Orbitkey Desk Mat
If you’ve ever wanted to hide notes so well that you’ll invariably forget they’re there, now you can. The Orbitkey Desk Mat has a soft vegan leather surface that resists spills, protects our leathered friends, and, just like your teenage son, has secrets. There’s a slim compartment for papers which complements the upper tool tray and magnetic cable organizer. The very bottom is PET felt which dampens annoying key noise and protects your desk from violent keyboard shenanigans.
ElevationLab GoStand for iPhone
Despite the conflicting instructions in the GoStand’s name, it is a quality way to prop up your iPhone, and, don’t tell ElevationLab, but really any phone. Made of silicone with a machined steel hinge, it’s durable enough to withstand years of physical, and presumably psychological abuse. The smooth slide that holds the phone accommodates cases of most sizes, and works with MagSafe chargers. It handles portrait and landscape orientation, then folds down to be rolled into your sleeve like a ‘50s greaser.
Gingko Octagon One Plus Portable Alarm Clock Desk Light
It’s a light that’s also a clock that’s also an alarm, all made out of sustainable wood so your Pacific Northwest clients don’t burn you in effigy. Intended to save space for portable operation, it even helps you focus on productivity by fading the clock away when not in use. Because where else would you find a clock in your office? With the alarm you can opt for a standard beep, or for the light to brighten your day.
Sony WH-1000XM4 Noise Canceling Headphones
Many home offices have children, pets, leaf blowers, trains, or gunfights nearby. With the Sony WH-1000XM4, you can live in the background of a John Wick movie and still have peace and quiet in your head. Able to block out external noise while using a directional mic to pick up your voice, you can hold meetings on an airport tarmac, or issue commands to Alexa in a weird bedroom whisper. Also uses Edge-AI with exceptional music quality for those days that require some speed metal.
ElevationLab AnchorPro
Everyone knows the heaviest item in any home office is your headphones. Thankfully, the AnchorPro is here so you no longer need to hang those weighty beasts on a load-bearing stud. The fiber reinforced composite build has double the strength of cast aluminum, but adds in the functionality of a cord guide to keep wires up, up, and away so as to avoid humiliating entanglements. Comes with both 3M adhesive mounting, and screws with drill bit option.
Autonomous ErgoChair Recline
If there’s one thing office chairs were missing, it’s a reclining function with built-in footrest. You can get excited about the adjustable headrest, height, reclining, and armrest, but all those do is make your power nap better. Though made with polyester, nylon, and foam, Autonomous is Gold Standard certified for minimum chemical emissions when it comes to building materials and finishings. The mesh rear avoids sweaty backs, but still has a lumbar reinforcement to straighten out your sassy spine.
Wipebook Pro +
Good ideas are built on the compost of bad ideas. In order to exorcize all those terrible thoughts, it helps to write them down, look at them, feel the disgrace of failure, then wipe them away to start anew. The Wipebook Pro + has all the functionality of a whiteboard built into the portable body of a ledger. It’s the perfect way to brainstorm to success without wasting trees that died just so we could scribble down punny project names.
Courant CATCH:3
“Greetings,” the CATCH:3 seems to say. “Might I hold all of your extraneous stuff to empty your pockets while I use my triple coils to charge your phone or other Qi-enabled device?” “Why, certainly,” you respond to the pad on your desk because you’ve been working from home too long. “And with your dapper Belgian Linen look I know you’ll keep everything secure from scratches. You’re going places, kid.”
Yamazaki Cable Management Box
Until the energy wizards learn how to make everything wireless, cord clutter is going to happen. While you might not be able to change that, you can hide them all in this tasteful gray box. Polished enough to look at home on top of your desk, but hardy enough to handle being put underneath where it can be kicked, the box provides plenty of exit ports for getting your cables where they need to go without looking like a snare for some jungle creature.
Field Notes Pitch Black Notebook
Your ideas are too big for a pocket notebook, but you can’t lug a full-size journal around everywhere unless you really hit the gym. For the best of both worlds there’s the larger, but not too large, 4¾” by 7½” Pitch Black. These come in either grid or ruled format depending on whether you’re jotting thoughts or technical schematics. Either way, the paper is sturdy black/kraft duplex paper courtesy of French Paper Co.
Everyman Grafton Pen
A consummate virtuoso, you’ve graduated beyond using some disposable Bic pen for your scrawlings. You’re ready for a weighted writing implement with as much heft as your profound ideas. The Grafton is anodized aluminum that can withstand a nuclear blast so long as it’s in your pocket in a safe bunker. It accepts not only refills of its own kind, but can use most standard cartridges from the titans of ink, like Monteverde and the chuckle-inducing Uniball.
KeySmart CleanLight Air
Your home office is a disgusting germ factory. That isn’t your fault, it’s just the way things are. When you’re ready to fight the filth and improve your health, the CleanLight Air is the way to do it. It uses a combination of UV-C rays and 360-degree H13 Hepa filter to scrub your environment until it sparkles. Capable of sanitizing 161 square feet, it’s ideal for turning a small office into a tiny clean room.
Felix Gray Roebling
You can wear these out and about if you need to look smarter, but they’re even better for filtering out blue light, UVA and UVB rays that damage your eyes, and reducing glare, all with mottled style. They work with a prescription or not, as well as reading magnification. Whatever you pick, the Roeblings are made out of hand-finished organic acetate that protects the planet as much as your sweet peepers.
Artifox Pegs
Can all of your organizational woes be solved with a set of pegs? No, of course not. But, they can certainly give you a lot more options. While these look like modest little plugs for crushing up pills or hanging coats, they’re actually powerful rare earth magnets that can operate as bookends, paperweights, or file holders. They can create a shelf wherever you want one, and come in a black container that doubles as a holder for pens or syringes if you’ve got that kind of office.
Yamazaki Tower Deskbar
This isn’t the type of bar you might want at your desk, but it’s pretty good nonetheless. The simple design gives you a caddy to hold all your pocket accessories for quick access while taking up a modest amount of real estate. The steel and wood construction can handle anything you throw at it, or anything you throw it against, and it will still keep everything tidy without holding a grudge. Unlike your last VA.
Novogratz Calculating Llama
According to some product descriptions, science revealed that hanging a picture of a llama increased productivity by as much as 400 percent. That’s probably not accurate, but this is still a fun painting to have. Made in either wrapped canvas or framed style, this Giclee print uses archival-quality photo paper that fights fading and will stay just as whimsical as the day you bought it. The llama is forever. Do not question the llama.