Bio
Kurt Kohlstedt was born in Upstate New York, grew up in the Twin Cities of Minnesota (with brief periods living in Germany and Australia) and resided for a number of years in semi-sunless Seattle. He calls Minneapolis ‘home’ for the moment but is essentially a full-time digital nomad, enjoying the mixed bag of hardships and benefits that come from being an independent writer, publisher and entrepreneur with a small network of creative authors and talented coders that spans the globe. Recent live/work trips have taken him from Chicago to New York City, with Amsterdam and Berlin on the horizon as well, in which he intends to further exploring the coworking movement.
Kurt attended Carleton College and received a BA in Philosophy before spending a few years of working in and around the home design and construction fields. This brief stint of ‘regular job’ employment started with a small local architecture firm, followed by a graphic and industrial design agency in Germany and concluded with freelance construction and carpentry in Seattle. He ultimately began and completed a graduate degree at the University of Washington in sustainable architecture and urban design, with a focus on nomadic urbanism, adaptive reuse and portable housing.
Upon completion (or, more accurately: during procrastination) of his final thesis project for the MArch program in Seattle, Kurt started to write online content about urban art, design and visual culture. Before long, WebUrbanist became a full-time (pre)occupation and was followed by the eventual creation of WebEcoist (sibling site to WebUrbanist) as well as Dornob and Gajitz - these sets of sites were founded under Webist Publishing and Misnamed Media, respectively. Currently, he remains active as executive editor and contributing author on WebUrbanist, lead co-editor on Gajitz and part-time editor and author on Dornob.