Over the past year, I've been rediscovering the art and science of community-building in a post-COVID world. While the way we gather has undeniably changed, there's a groundswell of renewed energy around forming connections. This movement—a blend of hyperlocal initiatives and innovative tools—might just signal the emergence of a new "neighborverse."
One thing I've noticed–These stewards often start out this work in the solitary, lonely journey that many of us community-builders know too well. When I participated in Cabin's Neighborhood Accelerator Program (NAP) to bootstrap a block association last summer, one thing that struck me is how uncommon and unusual it is to find the kind of person who is willing to step up for their neighborhood or city.
But another thing I've noticed–These groups seem to naturally coalesce and find each other (whether online or offline). There is a lot of incredible work taking place today among like-minded community-builders, so I wanted to share some of the themes I've been seeing as a way to help connect some dots for you, too.
Who's Building the New Neighborverse?
Bespoke Coworking Spaces
Reimagined Bulletin Boards
Co-Living Communities
Pop-Up Cities and Neighborhood Accelerators
1. Bespoke Coworking
One of the first things I sought out as a fractional worker in a post-COVID world was a coworking community that felt a little more emotionally satisfying than just a cookie-cutter location. I was so lucky to stumble upon Workplayce, a coworking space and childcare facility on the Upper West Side. What I love about Michelle Chan's vision with this space is that she's fusing together two disparate (and largely incompatible) concepts–working with your kids. The prototypal daycare drop-off culture doesn't lend itself well to parents actually meeting each other; when Workplayce opened, it was the first time I really got to know my near-peer set of Upper West Side working parents. Two years in, and I can honestly say this is where most of my friends have been stemming from.
This bespoke coworking–small spaces with a hyper-niche–seems to be a new trend of this post-COVID community era. I've found myself similarly drawn to the intentional design of Friends Work Here, a Brooklyn-based coworking community that begun in 2015 but seems to have an even more important stickiness in today's era. Even more novel is Fabrik, a third space for community builders who often feel like they don't have another place to call home. Their Tribeca location gives off cozy living room vibes in a way that makes you want to cuddle up with a book and stay forever.
2. Bulletin Boards 2.0
In addition to coworking and community spaces, I've noticed a resurgence of next-gen, civically minded organizations. (Maybe implicitly, or even explicitly, trying to tackle the "Bowling Alone" problem. This can sometimes be technology focused or tech-inspired, like BetaNYC, but one consistent theme seems to be the idea of a reimagined bulletin board. BetaNYC has excellent NYC community news digests that set out to share not only local events & initiatives but also community resources.
But it's not just happening in New York City. Julia Gitis is the founder of Community News Lab, an emergent San Francisco based initiative that's working to establish "news kiosks" (think: LinkNYC, but less ads, more local flavor) around the city to help prompt hyperlocal news. New_Public is taking this idea even further (and more digital-native) by exploring work around both a reimagined newsletter or community digest and the opportunity space that exists in the comments section of various channels all over the Internet. That current social media broadcasts are failing as this new ilk of community-building organizations are getting a stronger toehold is (I hope) an exciting indication about what's coming around the corner.
3. Co-living, Redefined
One of the highlights in participating in the Cabin Neighborhood Accelerator program was learning alongside neighborhood mentors like Shani Graham, who, over past several years has been building up a collective, communal space in south west Beaconsfield, Australia. This group, now-named the West Beacy Bunch, works together in a co-created vision that incorporates
This reminds me of Village SF, a multi-generational co-living community in San Francisco, and also Fractal NYC, a Brooklyn-based collective. While each carries their own particular flavor and intentionality, what I love about these co-living communities is that they also lean deeply into this "everyone can teach" mentality and encourage intergenerational storytelling, classes, or other collaborative initiatives to deepen connection. It's really hard to get co-living right, but I do wonder if we are starting to look for places to live and connect outside of a classic shoebox apartment where you never get to know your neighbors.
4. Pop-Up Cities and Neighborhood Accelerators
It's been fun to see crypto-native communities double down on IRL. The first instance of this I saw was when Cabin, an onchain collective of like-minded community-builders, redesigned their vision to lean into building supporting resources for the neighborhood builder worldwide. The Cabin Neighborhood Accelerator Program, a 10-week crash course in community, treated the work of bootstrapping a neighborhood as no different from bootstrapping a company. They recognized clearly the emotional gap in the marketplace to help community-builders keep going, what with all of the slammed doors in faces, empty event gatherings, and clipboard data capture attempts.
Another example of onchain community-building turned IRL has been the creation of extensive, immersive undertakings like Zuzalu, or pop-up cities. Bolstered by onchain tokenomics and hyperlocal digital economies, the ever-nomadic crypto community gathers so frequently at conference circuits around the world that it wasn't at all unusual to conceptualize a 2-month-long, pop-up city in Montenegro. Each week had different themes and programming, and 200+ people came and went from all over the world. While certainly not accessible to all, this innovative concept does challenge us to rethink how geographic boundaries are no longer the limiting factor toward IRL human connection.
While it's all still very grassroots, I do hope that this collection of community-builder initiatives is an indication that we are tipping toward a larger pattern of what it means to rethink neighborhoods, communities, and hyper-local connection.
And by the way, if you're hearing about other pockets of these new network effects in action or other groups building out initiatives for this new neighborverse, I'd love to hear about it. As I've learned, it's (still) not as common as you'd think...
