Inside Station North’s latest space for entrepreneurs

A couple of years after opening its first location in Mt. Vernon, The CO-OP expanded to Station North. The goal is to offer flexible office space, and bring growing businesses to the area.
The CO-OP at Maryland Ave. opened late last year, and has a mix of tenants moved in. During a recent tour, Teddy Davidson ticked off digital agency Diamond Hook Media, a steel and metal broker, a carpet installer, the nonprofit Share Our Strength and the gubernatorial campaign of Alec Ross as a few tenants.
Davidson is a cofounder of Par Collective, which is behind the space. The building, which was converted to an office space that once housed a health center from rowhouses by a previous owner, has a mix of individual offices and suites.
The goal, Davidson said, is to work with “any kind of small enterprise from the early stages to the point where they’re doing big things.”
The model is based on flexibility. Companies can configure how many offices they lease based on what they need, and could take more space as they grow.
Like the first iteration, there’s also a focus on building a community. The office has shared common areas, as well as a large kitchen/community area. There’s also a big conference room for meeting needs.
To Davidson, the expansion proves there’s strength to the model of colocating smaller companies, and providing then with room to develop. He sees these smaller firms as key to Baltimore’s growth.
“We’re excited about what we’ve been able to integrate between the two, and we think it bodes well that there’s the both the demand and increase in options for smaller companies,” he said. “I think that’s an important piece to strengthening the local economy as a whole, and gets little recognition.”

 

It’s also sign that small enterprises are part of the mix in the arts and entertainment district. And the Maryland Ave. cycletrack that rolls past the door offers a reminder that it’s close to modes of transportation like Penn Station and I-83, as well.
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