BUSINESS REVIEW OF THE YEAR
ADVERTISING FEATURE
IT ’ S ALL BEEN GOING ON AT THE WORKSHED IN 2023
Set within Brunel ’ s former Railway Carriage Works , Workshed has been a hive of activity in 2023 with many events offered by business support providers including The Federation of Small Businesses , TechSpark , Swindon Software and The Future Smiths , to name just a few .
Workshed membership has increased with more than 350 companies making the most of the space regularly for a variety of uses . The unique space has hosted meetings , interactive workshops , launch events , quizzes and social business networking events .
Construction work to the neighbouring units finished in the spring . Create Studios moved in and beyond their regular production delivery have sofa cinema screenings every Friday evening at 7 Carriage Works , SN1 5FB . They also run a micro café that all businesses can enjoy . Create Studios celebrated their 40th anniversary with a fabulous launch event earlier this year and created a video to share their business development story .
The University of Bath ’ s iCAST ( the Innovation Centre for Applied Sustainable Technologies ) moved into their new space over the summer .
Matthew Davidson , Professor of Sustainable Chemical Technologies at the University of Bath and Director of iCAST , said , “ We are very excited to be part of bringing innovation in sustainable technologies back to Brunel ’ s Carriage Works . We link business with the research and innovation expertise of the Universities of Bath and Oxford and the High Value Manufacturing Catapult , in order to accelerate the translation of fundamental research into commercial reality .
“ Swindon is ideally located between the two universities , so having our Creative Hub at the Carriage Works makes perfect sense and we look forward to further developing our part in Swindon ’ s dynamic business community .” iCAST have already worked on collaborations with Carriage Works businesses , Create Studios and New Elements to create content for The Festival of Tomorrow – an expo featuring the wonders of science , innovation and the arts to share new discoveries and technologies .
Talking about the Festival of Tomorrow , Rod Hebden of New Elements explained , “ New Elements has been based in the Workshed since it first opened in 2018 . My colleague Louise and I have organised Swindon ’ s Festival of Tomorrow from there since we first started work on it back in 2019 . We even ran the second festival online entirely from the
Workshed , including running the schools programme to 13,000 students from over 30 Swindon schools .
“ As a micro business , being based at the Workshed has been invaluable ”
“ As a micro business , being based at the Workshed has been invaluable . Having access to that space for client meetings and events has been perfect . It presents a professional face , and is incredibly handy for the railway station with lots of the people we work with coming in from Bristol or London .
“ We ’ ve also been able to get to know lots of other businesses using the Workshed which has sparked ideas and partnerships which we would never have had otherwise .”
It has been a busy autumn for the venue which participated in the National Trust organised Heritage Open Days again in September , opening the doors to the public to see inside the unique space .
In October , it hosted a Rail Industry Association meeting at the Carriage Works , with activities happening in Workshed and iCAST simultaneously in collaboration with the Western Gateway .
2024 will see the completion of road works to London Street , offering an improved pedestrian experience for visitors from the railway and bus stations and through the 2 tunnels at Bristol Street and Sheppard Street . Further works to the Carriage Works street frontage will be completed in parallel .
The Workshed ’ s full offering includes :
• Flexible co-working and dedicated desk packages
• Meeting room hire
• Event space hire
• Workshop space
• Virtual Mailbox
( to use as a registered trading address )
We currently have office availability for a 4-person and a 16-person office available to licence .
Give us a call or email for more info or a tour of the site !
Tel : 07989390005 email : info @ theworkshed . co . uk
or book space directly online at : www . theworkshed . co . uk 16 www . tbeswindonandwilts . co . uk