Future Apartments of Crown Heights?

Saw this little gem below on Curbed. With all the apartment chopping happening left in right, perhaps this is what landlords will resort to in order to get more money. With a dishwasher and a back-splash, it might work. My landlord took a rent stabilized one-bedroom, opened up the kitchen, made the part of the living room into another bedroom. Voila, and he now charges $2400! It was snapped up pretty quickly.

http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2015/04/13/someone_is_paying_1795month_for_this_sad_kitchen_shower.php

Damn, why not put the shower in that closet? Not that that is a big improvement.

Either the landlord was too cheap or the bathroom was too small to attach the toilet paper to the wall.

It is quite common in Hong Kong and other cities for there to be no shower stall. The bathroom just has a floor drain.

I'm not sure how the new micro apartments will be designed, but it seems reasonable to me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/22/realestate/micro-apartments-tiny-homes-prefabricated-in-brooklyn.html

I read that in Japan there are apartments where there are no toilets and the people just squat over the drain but that doesn't mean I'd want to live that way. I mean, how would I be able to read???

I'm not sure if this is the future or just a lazy, cheap and extremely poor cash grab by the land lord. Actually, I'm pretty sure it's the latter. 

@whynot_31 I used one of those showers when I stayed in Berlin for a few weeks and just loved it. 

@pragmaticguy non-western toilets are still somewhat common in Japan. Perhaps whoever wrote what you read was confused about the concept of a toilet you don't sit on. 

As apartments become smaller and shared with others, residents cook less and eat out more.

It is part of why asian (and many european) cities have so many places to eat and get coffee; such public spaces provide the ability to read and relax that westerners have traditionally accomplished at home.

As our cities become more global and capital more fluid, such western traditions may become reserved for the rich.

Matter of fact, there was an article on Bloomberg today that for the first time ever people spent more money dining out that on groceries so it appears that this trend is well under way.

Which is ironic since cooking in is much cheaper and softer healthier. I couldn't imagine ever living in a place without room to cook.

It isn't just about room.

When I go out for dim sum, I consider how many hours it would take me to prepare the sheer variety of dishes being pushed by me. As a result of the economies of scale, the food is quite cheap.

But I am with you: I hope to always be able to afford enough space to cook in the inner city.

However, should the time come wherein I have to choose between having a kitchen or living in the suburbs, I might choose to eat out every meal.