New Westminster couple creates ‘box office’ for people working from home

NEW WESTMINSTER (CityNews) — An office in a box?

A New Westminster film and TV production designer thinks this may be a solution for people working from home who are frustrated with a lack of separation between their personal and professional lives.

Rick Whitfield has been a production designer for Marvel, Disney, Nickelodeon, and Netflix. In the spring, when COVID-19 put a pause on all productions in B.C. he had a chance to create something he had thought about for a while, a portable backyard workspace, aptly named ‘Box Office.’

“It’s a purposefully built office space. It’s very, very meticulously designed, super high quality. It’s not your typical garden shed,” he says.

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His wife Angie says she’s lucky to be the guinea pig for the project, and has moved into her very own backyard box.

“I found when I was working in the house I would go from the bedroom to the dining room, papers and work it just becomes really hard to separate. Not hopping back on the laptop after dinner,  or trying to clean the kitchen before you start work,” she says.

“I think it’s nice to have separation. There’s something about leaving your house and going to an office space that eases the transition from home life to work life.”

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Rick says it takes about 20 minutes to set the box office up, and each one costs about $30,000.

The project has kept Rick so busy that he has yet to return to B.C.’s now thriving film and TV industry. The pair say they are excited they were able to see through a project, like this one, during a very tough couple of years.