The word ‘nomad’ has gained prevalence in Japan in recent years, along with a new working style where people work from home or at their favorite cafés instead of heading to the same office everyday. This style has become so popular that some ‘nomad workers’ are starting to feel annoyance at having to get up early to secure a good spot at a café, and on top of that pay for beverages and snacks once they are there.
That’s where coworking spaces come in. A coworking space is a place where people can work in a stylish, café-like environment for a monthly fee. These spaces provide espresso machines, copy machines and lockers to store paperwork and function like regular offices while allowing users to work freely in comfort. Coworking spaces also make it possible for freelance workers or small start-ups to facilitate communication.
Nevertheless, humans are naturally greedy beings and have started to become dissatisfied with working in the same location, staring at the same surroundings day in and day out. How great would it be to be able to choose where you work on any given day depending on your mood, for as little money as possible?
Enter 「Spacious」, a new service from New York.
Spacious is a service that takes advantage of empty restaurants outside of trading hours by using them to provide coworking space. The idea came about when they realized that most dinner restaurants in the city are closed during the day, and thought why not make use the unused space as coworking offices.
The service is easy to use! First, sign up for the free trial and test it out for a day. Then it’s $95 dollars a month to use any of the coworking spaces provided by the company.
The service started this year and there are only 3 locations at the moment, however I was lucky enough to talk to the CEO, Preston Pesek, when I went in to photograph one particular space. He told me that the number of available locations will increase by the end of the year, and before long users of the service will be able to work in many different locations all around the city.
Let’s now take a closer look at one of the restuarants.
L'Apicio is an Italian restaurant open for dinner in the evening and is approximately a 3-minute walk from 2nd Ave station on the MTA F line.
You can tell that this restaurant is one of the locations provided by Spacious by the sign out the front.
Inside, a friendly Spacious staff member is waiting to greet you. The CEO is working in the back.
Hot coffee, hot water and sparkling water are provided on the bar counter. Anything bearing the Spacious logo is free to drink.
The high ceiling and spaced table arrangement creates a very comfortable atmosphere. Many New York cafés feel cold due to excessive use of cooling systems, however this place is just right and that’s important.
The stylish atmosphere makes it easy to invite clients in for a meeting, then move onto a business dinner once the restaurant opens. Spacious is still relatively new and as such the service doesn’t have too many users, however the time is now for people who wish to work in comfort at their own pace.
It’ll be exciting to see which restaurants are added to the lineup of Spacious coworking spaces next. If you want to be able to choose your office depending on your mood on any given day all the while keeping costs low, Spacious is the service for you.
If you have any requests or complaints after signing up, just speak to the Spacious staff member who is probably working right near you!
Restaurant name：L'Apicio
Location：13 E 1st St New York, NY 10003
ライター。宮城で生まれ育ち、大学から東京へ上京し、海外での滞在を経て、今現在は京都で事業を行なっています。「泊まる〜暮らす」の導線づくりをしています。
