Co-working Place Designs

In a coworking environment, not all designs are essential or appropriate. Looking at available square footage, floor plan layout, and space occupancy limits helps you choose the most practical alternatives. Demand may fluctuate over time. Operators of coworking spaces must keep track of space consumption trends and modify workplaces to the needs of frequent, repeat customers. Coworking spaces, like the individuals who use them, are continually changing.

Benching in the open air

The epitome of modern work environments is open-air benching. There are no special considerations or designated seating. It’s just a table and a chair, waiting to be used.

Although it may appear utilitarian, most people only require open-air benching to work. Full-sized workstations and offices are no longer necessary in the age of laptops, tablets, and smartphones. When there’s enough room for a laptop and a few documents, even the most utilitarian space becomes a true workspace.

Open-air benching takes a lot of the logistics out of space planning for coworking spaces. Count the number of seats available and fill them as needed. There’s no need to be concerned about who sits where.

Pods and communities

Pods are a type of benching that is more compact. To generate a sense of proximity, these workspaces limit the number of people—usually between three and six—in genuine shared space design. Small groups encourage networking and collaboration, which makes them ideal for social workers.

Controlled seating is another benefit of pods. To encourage a pleasant work atmosphere, coworking facilities might distinguish pod assignments in a variety of ways: a graphic design pod for artistic workers, a programming pod for software engineers, and pods for jazz music fans. The possibilities are endless, bringing people together on similar ground.

Collaboration areas that are private

Private collaborative spaces are the usual for groups, despite the fact that they require bigger swathes of devoted square estate. Startups, small businesses, and study groups all require a private location where they may work uninterrupted. That can mean a room aside from the main work areas in coworking places.

To support groups, a coworking space may only require one or two of these types of spaces. Alternatively, they may have larger rooms designated aside for groups that can be used by people when they are not in use. Offering these seats on a request-only basis is a clever method to encourage bookings and gauge utilization rates.

Zones of work

Operators can better manage coworking spaces by dividing them into zones. Zones can provide repeat visitors a sense of belonging.

Colors are an excellent technique to distinguish areas:

Workplaces in the blue zone are quiet.

Green Zone: Seating in the open air

Individual desks are located in the purple zone.

It’s simple to say, “Find a seat anyplace in the Green Zone” or “You’ll be at Purple Zone Desk Two.” It’s also simple to charge extra for different sorts of workstations and track usage of each zone to get a better picture of how the facility is being used.

Workspaces for individuals

It’s a gamble to run a coworking space with simply individual workstations. There’s no assurance those seats will be full 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. However, it is critical to provide some individual private workstations. For phone calls, webinars, one-on-one meetings, and other sensitive work, people require seclusion.

Most coworking spaces charge more for individual offices or only make them available by reservation because they are inefficient in terms of space use. When there is a lot of demand for these restricted spaces, it’s a good idea to set a time limit on how long people can reserve them.