Living in a Store Edit
Mark Malkoff Lives in IKEA

As a kid, I used to day dream about living inside a store. I’m not that crazy though, I didn’t actually do it. Mark Malkoff, on the other hand, did.

His NYC apartment was getting fumigated, so instead of invading a friend’s place, or shelling out for a hotel, he moved into an IKEA store on January 7th, 2008, and has been keeping a video blog ever since. His plan was to live, and sleep there, for one week.

“To make matters worse, the plumbing doesn’t work!” Mark says of his IKEA bathroom, and the plastic pasta? A little disappointing.

Sure the Swedish store is cool, and there’s so much to see, but would you want to live there? Can you picture him sneaking into the IKEA kitchen at night for some Swedish meatballs, snacking on Daim candies late at night while lounging in the kid’s hammocks as he flips through the latest catalog?

It’s more fun to pretend he’s secretly living there, but he actually got approval from IKEA. How else would he be able to pull off these public YouTube videos of his life in a Swedish megastore, posted officially on MarkLivesinIkea.com?

His videos are HILARIOUS!! This must be the best marketing campaign I have ever seen. Check them out! This is just a sampling, more can be seen on his site.

Mark Wakes up in IKEA:

Mark goes to lunch in IKEA:

Mark closes IKEA:

Mark works out in IKEA:

Mark gets lost in IKEA:

Mark’s date in IKEA:

It seems Mark Malkoff and I aren’t the only ones who have thought about living in a store. Remember the guy that lived in a mall?

Secret Apartment - Hidden Home Built Into a Mall (VIDEO)

Michael Townsend takes the term “mall rat” to a whole new meaning—the Leesburg, Florida man literally lived in a mall for four years. He built a secret home in an abandoned section of his mall parking garage space which he deemed “the apartment.” “We saw this forgotten land in the mall,” he said… [More]