High vibes at low altitudes: floor parties, explained

Why perfectly healthy Brooklyn hipsters cannot stand while socializing

If you’ve been to a private party during the past two years in Williamsburg or the more expensive parts of Greenpoint and Bushwick, you will have experienced a trend known as floor parties. It’s when people who have full use of their legs and access to traditional furniture, such as chairs, couches and ottomans, freely choose to sit on the floor. Partygoers typically arrive, remove their Birks and Sabahs at the door, hug whomever is closest to the entrance for an awkwardly long time to show other partygoers just how vulnerable and emotionally available they are, get a glass of non-alcoholic functional elixir, scan the room for Burning Man camp founders, DJs and people they want to casually sleep with, and then low-key make their way through a sea of custom kimonos and robes to position themselves for when – typically ninety minutes after the suggested arrival time – it’s time to sit down on the floor and vibe with the people with whom they want to go deep.

Sitting on the floor has entirely changed the social dynamics and topography of parties, not to mention the backgrounds of status-signaling selfies on Instagram, and I needed to understand why this was happening. I spoke with a number of specialists in a variety of fields to get to the bottom of it by asking them what they believed was behind the precipitous drop in party altitude.

“Standing at a party perpetuates toxic masculinity,” said self-proclaimed consent educator and intimacy coach Lucile Demarchand. “Men are on average seven percent taller than women, and while we wait for evolution to correct this disparity it’s critical that we find ways as a society to eliminate gender-based height bias, particularly in social situations where males can leverage their height to assert visual dominance over female-identifying humans.” She went on (and on) to explain that “parties where people are standing inherently force women to look up to men, which can compromise judgment in choosing casual sex partners.” I made a mental note to search on Amazon for high heeled socks.

“I worry about their lung capacity,” offers Dr. Sergei Molotov, an avuncular, 60something internist and longtime resident of a less expensive part of Greenpoint. When I asked just what exactly the fuck he was talking about, his response was alarming. “Younger adults who live in Williamsburg or the more expensive parts of Greenpoint and Bushwick are eight times more likely to have had Covid-19 than people who live on the Upper East Side, Greenwich or Mill Valley, and since almost single-handedly spreading the virus in 2020 to Verbier in the winter, Venice Beach in the spring, and Ibiza in the summer, most of this at-risk population have contracted the virus at least twice through group sexual activity, long table dinners at Upstate organic farms, and casually sharing Snogos.”

A quick and easy hack into Apple’s database of iPhone user location data, which in early 2020 showed simultaneous spikes in visits to bone broth vendors and drops in kundalini yoga class attendance following flights to Zurich, LAX and Barcelona, supports Dr. Molotov’s assertion that Brooklyn hipsters were hit particularly hard by Covid-19 and also basically caused the pandemic.

“Oxygen is more plentiful in the air at three feet above floor level than it is at six feet because of science, and I believe that younger, more socially promiscuous adults have subconsciously adapted their party behavior to vibe at levels where breathing with their Covid-compromised lungs is just a tiny bit more chill.” Science.

Others, who have blatant commercial agendas, assert that ultra-niche home furnishing microtrends are foundational to floor party culture. Amazon doom-scrolling opportunist, Google keyword expert, and Burning Man eCommerce entrepreneur Paige Allman has a totally different take on why people are getting down on the floor.

“Body pillows,” she says with an in-the-know nod and an algorithm manipulating twinkle in her eyes. “They’ve made being on the floor so much more ecstatic.” These body pillows, made in Wuhan, China of polyester and a cotton substitute marketed as Organic Fair-trade Blue State Hemp, are between four and six feet long and make couches and beds look unkempt and just fucking horrible, so after being purchased while under the waning influence of MDMA at four o’clock in the morning on Tuesdays after dancing at House of Yes, these pillows are relegated to the floor.

“Our body pillows have added a use case to floors all over Williamsburg and the more expensive parts of Greenpoint and Bushwick — rolling around and vibing with friends— and the best part is that you don’t have to ask for consent to cuddle with a body pillow. You can just squeeze and vibe with these pillows anytime, and they are totally down.” Sales of these pillows did in fact skyrocket during the pandemic along with candles and books about how to remove candle wax from shag carpets. The author gently declined Ms. Allman’s request to include a link in this article to her product’s page on Amazon.

Famed but entirely uncredentialed sex and relationship guru Lascivia Faust has yet another take on why post-work tech entrepreneurs and never-worked trust-funded adults at parties hit the deck as soon as the Pioneer decks start spinning the deepest of deep house music.

“It’s hard to be an adult these days, because pressure,” she says in a tedious vocal fry optimized for podcasts.

“People have to figuratively, like, stand in their jobs if they work, stand in their ethically non-monogamous romantic relationships, and stand in their social media identity, and some even have to literally physically stand on sometimes slightly long lines to buy their afternoon matchas when they wake up,” she says, shaking her head with wide, woke eyes.

“Standing in these contexts is just exhausting. By the time these over-stood souls get to parties in Williamsburg and the more expensive parts of Greenpoint and Bushwick they are physically and emotionally exhausted. They just want to lay on the floor and talk about where they’re spending their summer or winter or debate solo polyamory versus ethical non-monogamy.”

Unconvinced, irritated and slightly nauseated, I went out on a limb and asked the one person who knows and understands this population the best and would likely be the one true, unbiased source of enlightenment on why no one can stand standing anymore. My ketamine dealer. I wrote to him on Signal during his active hours – 10pm to 4am – and asked for his (her? their? I have no clue what this human looks like) opinion on the matter. This is their unedited response:

Well bro based on how infrquenlty you buy you probs have not been in a k hole so you can stand on your feets at parties. Msot of my clientele in Williamsburg and the more expnsive part of Greenpt and Bwick are super users and the moment they hit that hole they are flat out on the floor .  Hit me up soon if you need more k, global supply running v lowww..

After reviewing the data I collected from these domain experts and considering my own lived experience, I feel confident in concluding that floor parties are dope, and that standing at social gatherings is just for anxious Gen X members of the patriarchy who didn’t take advantage of remote work and fraud their way into Italy the summer of 2020, can’t eyeball gaze or go deep with a human, aren’t healed or whole enough to admit that standing is really tiring, don’t get invited to high-vibrational gatherings in Williamsburg or the more expensive parts of Greenpoint or Bushwick where the rugs are thick and soft and purchased in Marrakech and covered with body pillows that reek of buyers remorse, and still think that ketamine is just for the enjoyment of race horses.

During this most wonderful time of year, when Christmas carolers knock on your door, when you’re attending the company holiday party in Midtown East of your friend-who-works, or when you’re at your primary partner’s parents’ house for Christmas dinner in Bronxville, remember that standing up at parties is only the default because people outside of Williamsburg and the more expensive parts of Greenpoint and Bushwick just haven’t discovered the joy of sitting on the floor in a room filled with lots of high people and Le Labo candles. Lead these standing uninitiates into the future, and encourage them to just sit down by passing them your fully loaded Snogo.