Yahoo News 'Google-style' White City tech development Huckletree West offers creche for workers' children
Forget ping-pong tables, slides and craft beer taps in a noisy Shoreditch warehouse.
The founders of what is claimed to be the capital’s first tech co-working space to provide childcare say “mature millennials” want a creche.
Up to 450 tech entrepreneurs and freelancers will be able to book in their babies and toddlers at a new “Google-style” facility at the BBC’s former White City Place development near Shepherd’s Bush when it opens in summer.
Co-founders Gabriela Hersham and Andrew Lynch, who each have a one-year-old child, say it will allow the growing numbers of young tech workers in west London the chance to spend more time with their offspring in the week.
Mr Lynch, 29, said: “The millennials are growing up, they’re getting into their thirties, getting married and having kids. Their needs are evolving from ping-pong tables to childcare.
“They want to have the option of taking their child to the park at lunchtime and having some time with them during the day.
"They want to work somewhere they can actually live, somewhere with gym classes, yoga studios, healthy eating restaurants.”
Mr Lynch contrasted the lifestyle of his father — a lawyer who he rarely saw in the week due to his long hours — with his relationship with daughter Edie “who I get to visit every day”.
The childcare provision will not be at the co-working space itself — called Huckletree West — but by local specialists at a price likely to be from £1,400 to £1,600 a month.
A desk at Huckletree West will cost about £150 a month while a shared office will be up to £650 a month.
There will also be half-day rates for parents who have children at nursery and can only work in the morning.
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The company, backed by six investors, has opened two sites in Clerkenwell and Shoreditch after raising £2.4 million.
It hopes to have at least six in London and 15 in total by 2020. Ms Hersham, mother to one-year-old Jack, is married to tech investor Antoine Nussenbaum, whose venture capital firm Felix Capital was one of the early backers of Deliveroo.
The founders believe west London has been passed by so far in the co-working revolution.
Ms Hersham said: “There are a lot of start-ups, tech businesses and venture funds in west London, but they are quite dispersed, there is no one hub. We want to make sure west London has its own innovation community.”
The capital already has a handful of co-working spaces with creches, such as Playpen in Mile End and Third Door in Putney, but they do not specialise in the tech sector.
Generation game: Huckletree founders Gabriela Hersham — with son Jack, one — and Andrew Lynch with Edie, also one. Above, Google’s office in Victoria
