Where flexible office space started, and how it has changed over the years.
According to coworking resources, shared workspaces have grown at a rate of 21.3% year over year and are projected to be at 40,000 spaces by 2024- but where did it all start? Let's go back in time and see.
1995
Starting in Berlin, Germany- the first coworking space called C-Base was used by computer engineers as a hackerspace. The goal was to provide them with a facility in which they could collaborate and obtain knowledge from their peers.
1999
Bernard DeKoven coins the term coworking, while defining it as more of a way to work versus a place to work.
2002
Two Austrian entrepreneurs open up Schraubenfabrik in Vienna- where consultants, start ups and freelancers could go to work and get out of their homes, going into a fresh and productive environment.
2005
Brad Neuberg opened a coworking space at a feminist collective called the Spiral Muse in San Francisco's Mission District. Operating at two days a week, Neuberg had to pay $300 per month and was told he could keep whatever was left. In the first couple of months, not a single person showed up to work.
2010
On August 9th, five years after the opening of Neuberg's coworking space in San Francisco, an official coworking day is celebrated. Now, August 9th is officially International Coworking Day.