Gemma Church at Huckletree shares how the co-working pioneer is continuing to fuse tech and creativity with the opening of its new space in West London.
Gone are the days where you either had a creative or technical mindset. In today’s startup community, a growing wave of “digital lifestyle” businesses are fusing these two disciplines together.
Such fledgling businesses need a diverse skill set to really fly. Let’s say you have a killer idea for a fashion app. You need to understand the nuts and bolts of software development to make your app work seamlessly – but your app also needs to look the business to attract any business.
So, how do you bring together the world’s creative and technical minds to grow the perfect digital lifestyle business? Co-working pioneer Huckletree has the answer.
It’s opening a digital lifestyle accelerator in West London’s White City district. Huckletree West will be a pioneering hub for creative startups targeting business growth through tech innovation.
The new hub will meet the demands of London’s small business and entrepreneurial community.
Huckletree has already seen growth in the digital lifestyle startup space amongst members at both their Shoreditch and Clerkenwell workspaces and the new White City site is the perfect location to respond to this trend.
Collaboration between startups and established companies is a concept that’s seen growing popularity in recent times as both types of company realise working together is a vital step for long term stability and success. While corporations can learn from the bleeding-edge innovation and disruption so many startups embrace to answer customer demand in the here and now, newer businesses can learn how to scale up and succeed in the corporate environment.
Starting a conversation between businesses both old and new can be difficult, particularly when you need to connect technical and creative companies.
One of Huckletree’s Shoreditch site members has ample experience connecting these two groups. 100%Open is an open innovation business that connects “the suits and the sneakers” so corporations and entrepreneurs can benefit through mutual collaboration.
Its CEO and founder Roland Harwood, explained: “Getting creatives and techies to communicate clearly and without jargon can be a challenge. You also need to get these groups in the right frame of mind to work with a person with a different skill set.
“But that’s easy to do with the right environment and context – whether that’s an online community, workshop or a workspace accelerator like Huckletree West,” he added.
The Huckletree West space will certainly give digital lifestyle startups a diverse range of environments. A content creation pod is planned where members can livestream their own stories and share reactive content. There’ll even be a meditation garden.
It’s a space that will not just inspire but help digital lifestyle startups get the information and resources they need to succeed through mentorship, events and collaboration.
Huckletree West is West London’s first workspace accelerator for digital lifestyle startups and entrepreneurs. Membership applications are now open ahead of the launch in September 2017.
Click here if you’d like to apply or find out more.