Citizen Space was the second physical coworking space that we founded (the first one, The Hat Factory, we co-founded with Ryan Hodson, Jay Dedman and others). We had been talking about coworking for quite some time, so it was great to finally have a physical space (Chris had been wanting to start a space since he heard about Brad Neuberg’s day a week coworking gathering at Spiral Muse).
Finding a coworking space was very important to us. We had been working primarily out of our dining room, with smattering of coffee shops here and there. Although the vagabond techie lifestyle is exciting, it felt too liminal for our tastes. Our dining room made it tough for us to separate work and home (so both ended up suffering). Coffee shops were a nice change of pace, but were often crowded, noisy and the wifi was unreliable. We figured our sitting with one cup of coffee for 5 hours at a time was probably more than a little irritating for the coffee shop owners who needed to pay the rent, too.
It wasn’t working.
The Hat Factory was pretty cool, but not the exact right vibe for us. We needed something that straddled coffee shop and office. Something that looked professional and casual all at once. In September of 2006, we invited Ivan Storck to accompany us office hunting. We looked at quite a few places…most of them way too expensive or not quite right. On a whim, we decided to follow up on a space that hadn’t gotten back to us by just stopping by. This one was well-located and exactly the right size for our needs…and the price was incredibly reasonable.
We were incredibly fortunate, because the building owner happened to be hanging around at the moment we dropped by. He showed us a raw space that looked something like this:
But we saw the potential and took it right away. On November 1, 2006, we moved in to this:
Workspace, sweet workspace.
Citizen Space, for us, isn’t just about having a space to work, either. It’s about a philosophy. We wanted to have a space to open up for all of the other indies out there that needed a little refuge, too. A community space.
Oh…and somewhere along the way, it turned into a worldwide movement, which is pretty damned cool. Check to see if there is an effort in your area.