Harper-Thames investigates the co-working, community, coffee shop hybrid taking over empty units
A growing number of empty retail units across the neighbourhood have been converted into what’s increasingly marketed as “third space” venues, part café, part co-working space, part community hub, a hybrid model that’s become genuinely ubiquitous here over the past two years specifically.
What Exactly Is A Third Space
The term, borrowed from sociology, originally described informal community gathering places distinct from home and work. The commercial version currently proliferating across Shoreditch takes that concept and monetises it fairly directly, membership tiers, day passes, coffee that’s really a loss leader for the actual revenue driver, desk rental. I’ve visited six of these spaces now for this piece, and while each has its own particular aesthetic, exposed brick here, more minimalist there, the underlying business model reads remarkably similar across all of them.
“We’re filling a genuine gap,” said one third space founder I spoke with, whose venue opened eighteen months ago in a former print shop. “People want somewhere that isn’t quite home, isn’t quite a traditional office, and isn’t quite a café either. We’re trying to be all three at once, done well.” Early revenue figures she shared suggest the model, while requiring genuine ongoing community investment beyond just renting desks, can work financially given the right location and community management.
What This Means For Traditional Retail
Local business associations note the trend has helped fill previously vacant units that struggled under traditional retail models, though some worry the proliferation of similar spaces risks genuine market saturation as more operators enter what’s become a genuinely crowded category. “Everyone’s chasing the same customer right now,” said one local business consultant. “That works fine until it doesn’t, until there are simply more desks available than people willing to pay for them.”
Coverage from City AM has documented the broader flexible workspace sector’s growth extensively, offering useful context for understanding how this hyper-local Shoreditch trend fits into considerably bigger national patterns.
My Own Take
I like these spaces, genuinely, as places to actually work from occasionally. Whether the current proliferation is sustainable long-term, given how many have opened within a few streets of each other, seems like a genuinely open question the next eighteen months will likely answer more clearly than I currently can.
More from Harper-Thames at her author page on The London Prat.
Related coverage can be found at City AM.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/
