Working from home means the office door is also the pantry door, the hallway door and the door everyone knocks on exactly once before opening. The headset is on, the meeting is live, and somewhere behind the camera a voice is asking what the plan is for tonight.
The artwork settles it in the calm voice of a settings screen. A giant flat status pill runs across the chest, a dot lit at its left, ON A CALL filling the rest in heavy condensed capitals. A muted bell sits beneath it, and then the two house rules, set small and polite in sentence case: Do not come in. Do not ask what's for dinner. Clean vector shapes, three flat spot inks, no app, no logo, nothing borrowed from anyone's screen.
Built for the long-sleeve months, when the home office is the warmest room in the house and therefore the busiest.
It goes to the coworker who has muted mid-sentence to answer a question from the doorway, the partner running meetings from the spare room, or the friend who keeps threatening to put up a real sign. Bought for yourself first, then for whoever laughs at the second rule loudest.
Dinner will be discussed after the call.
