THE CITY · COWORKING NIGHT · Locuri

From the First Shared Desk in 2012 to 74,000 Square Meters

Adi Coco·June 8, 2026·6 min·

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On June 10, forty-eight coworking spaces across Bucharest will simultaneously open their doors in a single "open studios" evening — a celebration of the industry that has redefined, in less than fifteen years, what it means to go to work in a European city.

Coworking, briefly — for the uninitiated

A coworking spaceis an office you're not tied to. You pay for a spot — a day, a month, a year — and in return you get everything you need to work: a good chair, fast Wi-Fi, meeting rooms, coffee, a printer, and a reception desk that accepts your packages. It's like a café, but without fighting your neighbor for the power outlet. It's like a traditional office, but you're not paying for four walls you won't use for ten hours a day.

The options are open — from a hot desk (you pay for a seat, and it changes from one day to the next) to a dedicated desk (a fixed spot that's yours, with your things left there overnight) to a private office(an entire room, for a small team).

For anyone starting a company, or going it alone — a freelancer, a two-person agency, a first-year entrepreneur — coworking solves three problems at once: you don't lock yourself away at home, you don't pay for office space you can't fill, and you're surrounded by people doing the same thing. Sometimes that turns into clients. More often, friends. Almost always, things you couldn't have learned on your own.

night-coworking-bucharest-2026-offices-shared-kitchen — Stock

The numbers behind an industry that grew from nothing in ten years

According to an analysis by iO Partners (February 2026), Bucharest's flexible office market covers approximately 74,000 square meters spread across 48 locations— meaning over 2% of the city's modern office stock. The sector grew by 8.1% year on year in 2025 and received new deliveries of 5,600 sq m — an increase of over 300% compared to the previous year. Nearly seven in ten spaces are in Class A buildings and 84% of stock is located less than one kilometer from a metro station.

The geographic concentration is telling: Centru (25%), Floreasca–Barbu Văcărescu (17%), Centru-Vest (16%) and CBD (14%) together account for nearly three-quarters of the supply. Asking prices start at approximately 250 € per person per month in peripheral areas (Dimitrie Pompeiu and similar locations), rising to 350 € in the Centre-West and Floreasca, and reaching 400 € in the CBD and central zone.

These are figures that, in 2012, simply did not exist.

A Brief History of Coworking in București

2012. Impact Hub Bucharestopens on Calea Victoriei. It is Romania's first coworking space. The model comes from the international Impact Hub network (founded in London in 2005), but the Romanian chapter quickly becomes more than an office with Wi-Fi: a gathering place for freelancers, social entrepreneurs, and NGOs. In the years that follow, the community grows to more than 3,000 members.

2013. TechHub Bucharest— the second founding moment. Launched by Daniel Dragomir, Bogdan Iordache, and Ștefan Szakal, it becomes Romania's first space dedicated exclusively to the tech community. This is where the first serious Ruby, Python, and JavaScript meetups are held — and where several startups that will go on to become household names give demos to their first audiences.

In the years that follow.Coworking outgrows the "creatives + freelancers" niche and begins attracting companies. Mindspace (an international chain), Spaces (Regus/IWG, active in Bucharest since 1998), Connect Hub, NOD Makerspace, Commons, Nucleus — the city fills with spaces betting that the office of the future is no longer one company per floor, but one floor shared by many.

2019.A reportCrosspoint Real Estatemarks market maturity: 39 coworking spacesand22 serviced officeswere operating in Bucharest, totaling over71,000 sq m — roughly 2% of the office stock. It is the first time coworking has appeared in the general statistics of the real estate market.

2020. The pandemic. For one month, it feels as though everything will shut down forever. Then the opposite happens: hybrid work becomes the standard, companies begin trimming their own real estate portfolios and turning to flexible spaces for short-term projects, local hubs, and teams that no longer come to the same place five days a week.

2022–2025.The market matures. International operators expand. Local operators turn professional. The industry begins to be discussed in the language of workplace strategy, not just real estate. Market reports from consultancy firms (iO Partners, Cushman & Wakefield Echinox, Crosspoint) start treating coworking as a distinct segment, with its own indices.

2026.Fourteen locations. The first Romanian guide dedicated to companies looking to rent coworking space appears. The first edition of a Nightdedicated to the sector makes its debut.

What happens on June 10

The event is co-organized by BEYOND SPACE — a consulting and design company for flexible spaces, founded by Tudor Popp after nearly thirty years in real estate — together with ROFMA, the association of professionals in workplace, facility and property management in Romania (established in 2009, affiliated with the European network EuroFM). It is not an association dedicated exclusively to coworking, but one that represents the specialists who, in 2026, decide when and how large companies use flexible spaces. It is part of Romanian Design Week and of Bucharest Design Festival.

16:00 · Spaces Unirii — guide launch. "Coworking for Companies: A Practical Guide to Choosing the Right Flexible Workspace" is out — authored by Tudor Popp in collaboration with Cushman & Wakefield Echinox, one of Romania's largest real estate consultancy firms. It is the first Romanian guide dedicated to companies looking to rent coworking space — a sign that the industry is no longer a curiosity, but a budget line item.

17:00 · departure from Spaces Unirii — B2B tourThe Cushman & Wakefield Echinox team leads a tour dedicated to workplace, real estate, facility management, and HR professionals. Spaces will be visited as comparable products: size, offering, culture, infrastructure.

Evening · 48 spaces simultaneously. Each participating space opens its doors and sets its own programme — guided tours, workshops, networking sessions, wellbeing moments, startup pitches, discussions about the city and the future of work. There is no fixed route. Full list at wellbeing, startup pitches, discussions about the city and the future of work. There is no fixed route. Full list at www.cowo.ro.

End of evening · The Brewprint — shared celebration. Participants come together in a single location, after each has discovered a few spaces at their own pace.

For whom

Two audiences, in parallel.

For the city — for anyone who wants to see what an office looks like in 2026, when eight out of ten people no longer sit on the same floor five days a week. For the curious, for freelancers who haven't made the transition, for students preparing to enter the job market.

For the industry — for workplace managers, corporate real estate managers, facility managers, property managers, HR specialists, architects, interior designers, developers, investors, real estate consultants, coworking operators, and community managers. For this audience, the evening becomes an urban laboratory where flexible solutions can be observed firsthand, compared, and connected to the real needs of their organizations.