Get over the nostalgia. That coffee shop was losing money every month because people like you bought one $3 drink and sat there for four hours sketching. A WeWork brings in steady revenue, pays rent, and actually gives people a clean place to work without feeling guilty about camping out. Progress doesn't care about your mismatched armchairs.

The local guy is almost always better because they actually take the time to check each blade. Those big operations just run everything through the machine and hope for the best.

That thing she said about "your work looks too perfect" really hit home for me. I've noticed this same pattern in everyday life, like how people only post the vacation highlight reel on social media but never show the flat tire or the lost luggage. We get so caught up in polishing things that we forget the messy middle is where the real learning happens. In my experience, showing the struggle makes you more relatable and proves you can actually solve problems, not just clean things up. Your mileage may vary, but I've seen contractors and other trades get way more respect when they walk a client through what went wrong and how they fixed it. Take this with a grain of salt, but I think that designer gave you some solid advice.

on a design degree" lol did his professors just never check his work?

I read somewhere that dry-aging at home is basically a controlled rot, which explains why that blue cheese flavor hit so hard. 14 days is a lot for a home setup cause you don't have the air flow like a pro place does. Next time I'm pulling it at day 10 and hoping for less of a mold bomb.