The shortest free residencies I could find

On finding the time to write, and sharing my list

The view from the 2024 Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, which worked out because I was in between a federal clerkship and my next job.

As some folks reading this know, I’ve been writing fiction for the past three years or so now. I’ve been working on bigger projects (which I hope to share soon) and which have necessitated sneaking away small pockets of time here and there. Two hundred, three hundred words at a time. Thirty minutes before the world wakes up, when darkness still hangs over the Houston skyline, or two paragraphs tapped out on my phone before bed.

But then, this past year, I learned about writing residencies and I became obsessed. I’ve had some friends attend various residencies this past year, and I can’t help but envy them. How luxurious, to have whole stretches of uninterrupted days devoted to writing. To be somewhere beautiful, to be immersed in the work. To take a step away from the endless deluge of threats to democracy, which has exploded my work days, and sit in quietude with art.

Unfortunately, most of these residencies are at least two weeks, if not more. Anything over two weeks would wipe out all my meager vacation time in one go, and right now my work post-inauguration has been so intense that I’m desperately looking forward to the days off sprinkled through the next few months. I imagine that many other writers with demanding jobs (or parents!) are in similar positions, where it would be both impossible and unfathomable to take more than two weeks off. (Residencies, if you’re reading this: have you considered a three-day-weekend option? A five-day option? Asking for a friend.)

But there are some shorter (and free) residencies, and in the spirit of racking up rejections, I’ll be applying to a few this year for the first time. Of course, I don’t know if I’ll get in. I don’t know if I’ll be able to attend. Nevertheless, I’m applying out of a spirit of optimism—that I’ll get in, that I’ll be able to take the vacation, that the world will still exist by the time these residency periods roll around, that there is still reason to seek out moments to spare for our creative lives. I hope you’ll apply too.

One Week Residencies Offered

• Art OMI (Ghent, NY)

• Celia and Wally Gilbert Artist-In-Residence Program (Cold Spring, NY)

• Edith Wharton–Straw Dog Writers Guild Writers-in-Residence Program (Lenox, MA)

• In Cahoots Residency (Petaluma, CA)

• Playa Flamingo, Costa Rica Residency (Guancaste, Costa Rica)

• Wildacres Retreat (Little Switzerland NC)

• Voices of the Wilderness Residency Program (Girdwood, AK)

• Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (Amherst, VA)

Two Week Residencies Offered

• Anderson Center at Tower View (Red Wing, MN)

• Anne LaBastille Residency (Saranac Lake, NY)

• I-Park (East Haddam, CT)

• Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts Residency (Nebraska City, NE)

• LogHaven (Knoxville, TN)

• MacDowell (Peterborough, NH)

• Millay Arts Residency (Austerlitz, NY)

• Ragdale (Lake Forest, IL)

• Sitka Center for Art and Ecology Writing Residencies (Otis, OR)

• Storyknife Writers Retreat (Homer, AK)

• The Watermill Center (Water Mill, NY)

• Ucross Residency Program (Ucross, WY)

• Writers at the Eyrie (Brooklyn, NY)

• Yaddo (Saratoga Springs, NY)

• Vermont Studio Center (Johnson, VT)

Note: Most of these residencies have longer-stay options, but I grouped them by their shortest available residency period.