Hi, I'm Nikolaj

I’ve been self-employed for 20 years. I started out as a DJ, playing more than 200 events, and discovered how much I enjoyed creating experiences that brought people together. I found my clients through online marketing, and became equally fascinated by what the internet made possible: reaching people, testing ideas, and building a business from very little.

Since then, I’ve worked mainly with online marketing, both as a consultant and through different startups. The projects have varied, but I’ve kept coming back to the relationship between what we can build online and what it allows us to create in the real world.

Working remotely from 2012 opened my eyes to how differently life could be organised. It led to a growing interest in architecture, cities, communities, and the choices we make about where and how we live.

That year, I organised a retreat for 20 entrepreneurs in a remote villa in Spain. I wanted to meet other self-employed people, but the experience became the beginning of Refuga. Over the following five years, I organised retreats and adventure trips around the world, bringing together more than 500 entrepreneurs. It gave me practical experience in turning an idea into something people would commit their time and money to, and then making it work on the ground.

After becoming a parent, my interest in community became more focused on families. I had spent years studying communities and cohousing, and wanted to explore whether the same sense of belonging could be built among families travelling together.

That became Traveling Village, where 20 families travel the world together for four months. The ambition was to create a real community, with enough time for relationships to develop and for people to share everyday life. Bringing that idea into practice meant thinking about both the experience as a whole and the many details that make it possible.

Revillage builds on that experience with a bigger ambition: to bring families together to settle in small European villages, creating lasting communities while contributing to the life of existing towns. So far, we’ve organised our first pop-up in Semur-en-Auxois, France, with strong support from the local community. It was a first step towards that vision, giving us practical experience and local relationships to build on as we explore a longer-term model.

What I want to do now is use my experience of building businesses and bringing people together to create something lasting. I believe there is an opportunity to build a substantial company around a new kind of village that makes everyday life better for families. Realising that will take more than a strong community concept. It will take thoughtful development, a viable business model, and people with different kinds of expertise working together. That’s the next stage I want to help build.