You Don't Need Global. You Need Neighbourhood.
Five ways to build civic infrastructure in your neighbourhood—from a conversation to a continent-wide movement.
Your neighbours don't know you exist.
They walk past your building every day. They buy coffee three doors down. They complain about loneliness on the group chat.
But they have no idea there's a space where people actually gather, work together, and build something that matters.
You can't compete with the Death Star venture-backed workspace companies on reach. You'll never have their marketing budget or their global visibility.
But you can build something they can't: an addressable neighbourhood audience.
I talked about this with Mark Masters on the Coworking Values Podcast this week. Mark said: "Building an audience today is not about reaching more people. It's about being able to reach the same people again."
Reach is "Who might see this?"
Return is "Who comes back?"
You don't need to be everywhere. You need to be somewhere people can find you again.
That's what European Coworking Day is for.
Wednesday, May 6th, 2026 is the day you stop being invisible and start being findable in your neighbourhood.
Here are five ways people in our network are building returnable spaces right now—from the simplest conversation to a continent-wide movement.
Way 1: Start a Talk Club
Stop guessing how people are feeling.
Talk Club is a talking and listening club for men. Forget complex onboarding or a mandatory app—the heart of it is just a time, a space, and a simple format that lets people say what they are actually experiencing.
It looks like blokes having a conversation. That's the whole thing.
But here's what makes it work: it happens at the same time, in the same place, every week.
People know where to come back.
Ewan from Contingent Works talked about how he hosts one at Unreasonable Connection at Blue Garage—it's changed his community.
Talk Club site
Way 2: Host an ACTionism Screening
Jon Alexander's work on the "Citizen Story" is the backbone of what we do.
Hosting an ACTionism documentary screening is a wonderful way to spark a conversation about ownership and agency with people from your local area.
You do not need a cinema. You need a wall, a screen, and chairs. Maybe some drinks.
The film does the work.
Urban MBA showed it. Village halls are showing it. Coworking spaces like Patch and Dragon Coworking are showing it.
Roland from Dragon Coworking will be at our gathering on May 19th—ask him what happened when he screened it at his space.
It creates what Mark calls a "repeatable moment"—a gathering people remember and want to come back to.
Way 3: Run a Creator Write Club
For a decade, we ran these across London, sometimes in multiple spaces a week.
We must have run 500+ Creator Write Club sessions over the years.
Sometimes 20 people would come for months at a time. Other times, three people would turn up.
It went in seasons. Six months of packed rooms, then a dip, then it would pick back up again. Because it was a regular free event, you learned the seasons and fluctuations in energy.
I learned the hard way what it takes to get people in a room.
After my first hundred meetups, I got used to the minor anxiety attacks before every event—not knowing if anyone would show up.
Here's the reality: you always need to do more marketing and communicating than you think.
There are things I want to go to—I've bought the plane ticket—but I still haven't registered for the actual event.
People are like that. Even when they want to come, even when they care, they forget. They get busy. They mean to RSVP and don't.
After 500 sessions, I learned: you can't control who shows up.
What you CAN control is the ritual.
Around a single table, you'd find a journalist next to a poet, a musician next to a sailor.
The ritual was always the same: state your intention, write in focused silence for two hours, then share what you made.
It's a tiny, powerful act against loneliness—a space to work alone, together.
And because it's the same ritual every time, people trust it. They come back.
It works anywhere from a village hall to a Zone 1 cafe, and all it costs is a table and the willingness to show up.
Way 4: Host a Pop-Up Coworking Event
You don't need a permanent building to create a returnable space.
I've run pop-up coworking events for years—in London backrooms, rural cafes, and now, right here in Galicia where I now live, my local LiveGalicia crew run Galipreneur Connect.
Our spot is a small local coworking space within a vibrant textile and design hub.
You walk through the coffee bar, and upstairs, painters stand at their easels while our group works on laptops.
I LOVE IT!
It's a perfect, chaotic mashup of creation and work, and it's a five-minute walk from my front door. 👍
Same place. Same time. People know where to find us.
TLDR Pop-up coworking guide:
- Make everyone feel seen when they walk in the door. (hospitality)
- Pick a time and protect it. (ritual/consistency)
- Communicate more than feels comfortable. (marketing reality)
- Keep the format to one sentence. (simplicity)
- Name it and own it. (identity)
Way 5: Join the European Coworking Day Movement
May 6th is European Coworking Day. It's a powerful, people-powered movement run by our friends at Coworking Switzerland as part of the wider European Coworking Assembly —a network that includes London Coworking Assembly, Coworking Values Podcast and European Rural Coworking Project.
This very collaboration is our collective antidote to corporate coworking.
It's the moment for the independent spaces—the heart and soul of this industry—to be seen and counted.
And here's why neighbourhood matters economically: £1 spent locally goes round the economy four times. £1 spent with a big business leaves the local economy immediately.
When people come back to your space, when they buy coffee from you instead of Starbucks, when they book your meeting room instead of a venture-backed hot desk—that money stays in your community.
They extract rent. You circulate value.
Whether you're in a village in Galicia or a neighbourhood in London, this is your platform.
You don't need a huge budget. You don't need to know if anyone will show up.
You just need to show up.
A Talk Club, a pop-up, an open door—any of the ways listed above can be your contribution.
The goal is simple: put yourself on the map and say, "We're here."
Register your space today: European Coworking Day
Find people doing projects in your area
Our guest this week on the Coworking Values Podcast was Matt Golding, who runs "Screw This, Let's Try Something Else" with Maryam Pasha.
He's part of a group of people who spend their time and creative energy connecting with one another and finding others.
On their website for the Antidote Project, they have this line and an app:
"People are getting active to make our future better all across the UK. Find a project near you by popping your postcode into our new search tool."
Two ways to use it:
- Invite them to participate in your space - Find local projects and offer your space as their platform
- Support what's already happening - Connect with existing community projects and help them reach your members
Help connect your local community.
Meet the others doing this
Unreasonable Connection is back in person on Tuesday, May 19th at Space4, Finsbury Park, 10am-3pm.
We're meeting at Space4 because it's exactly what we're talking about: a long-running neighbourhood coworking space that's been creating returnable moments for years.
People in Finsbury Park know where Space4 is. They come back.
That's the model.
No keynotes. No panels.
Just the real conversations.
This is where you meet the people who run Talk Clubs, host ACTionism screenings, and build neighbourhood platforms.
We really have only got around 30 seats left! Book your place here
You don't need global.
You need your neighbourhood.
European Coworking Day is the day you show them you're there—and give them a reason to come back. Register your space today: European Coworking Day
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