For the last decade, Glasgow Collective has been a home for freelancers, start-ups and creative businesses in an old factory building that faces on to East Campbell Street. Now, the shared workspace is preparing for its next chapter – one that promises to blend art, enterprise, and community in the heart of the Gallowgate.

Glasgow Collective, which currently hosts 35 businesses and has supported more than 120 since it opened, has set out to create a culture of collaboration and sense of community within their workspace, reclaimed from a building that represents the city’s industrial past.

“It’s very much trying to create a dynamic of people supporting and understanding each other,” says Mark Armstrong, director of Collective Communities CIC. “People work together here, they learn from each other. After Covid, you could see the need for people to get out of the house, so freelancers come here just to sit and talk to others. It’s about building a place that fits what people need, not the other way around.”

This year, that mission is expanding. With coffee roasters Dear Green - one of the greatest local success stories to grow out of the collective - moving to larger premises in Bridgeton and artist collective WASPS vacating the upper floors, three levels of space are being opened up. Plans include an event space on the ground floor, learning zones, and deeper integration of artists into the building’s daily life.

The upper floors are atmospheric and rooted in the past, with huge windows and paint-splattered fittings that both illustrate its decade long association with artists working here within the Gallowgate area, including Peter Howson, and the building’s previous role as a workshop. Now it is being transformed to welcome future tenants to create their own story. The art community association will remain.

“We’ve got living and breathing artists upstairs. Tommy Lydon, who started the studios, has been here for 40 years. Imagine what a younger artist could learn from him if they were sitting side by side. That’s the idea – to create a learning zone where experience meets new energy.”

The upper floors of the building are being transformed into new office, studio and co-working space. | Paul Trainer

placeholder image — The upper floors of the building are being transformed into new office, studio and co-working space. | Paul Trainer

The collective are also keen to stress the importance of bringing together complementary businesses under one roof. “You’ve got artists, we then add a framing business, retail businesses, web designers, social media people – if we can get them supporting each other, it’s brilliant. That collaboration is already happening, and it’s why we’ve set up the Collective Community Circle. It’s about creating a cooperative voice so businesses can say: maybe I can’t do this, but someone in my co-op can.”

Recruitment is already under way for the next cohort of 15 members, who will be given a year of free space. “As a community, people thrive when they work together, and it might sound old fashioned and all that, but it works. These guys are putting in a real effort to make sure the dynamic works. The aim is to grow commercially successful businesses, but you do it together. It’s a very cool place to learn, to grow a business, and we are excited about adding to that with the new expanded space.”

David and John McBeth bought the derelict building in November 2014, reopening as Glasgow Collective and providing a focus for start-up businesses and community groups in the East End. David, a former surveyor, and John, who had a background in investment banking, renovated the ground floor of the former Saracen tool works with their savings.

The main area features hot desking pods, a kitchen, meeting rooms and open-plan seating. The upper floors are in the process of being turned from makeshift studios into more formal work spaces and coworking areas.

Mark and his business partners, the McBeth brothers, have a strong connection with the east end. “My great-great-great grandfather started a business here for the Irish community,” Mark recalls. “His best pal was David and John’s great-great-great grandfather, who owned the Dunn & Moore bottling plant in Bridgeton.

Mark’s family had a shop where The Gate pub is now on Gallowgate. “They supported people who didn’t have much. To walk past that shop today and think my ancestor stood there – it gives me goosebumps. It feels like we’re carrying that forward, opening doors for people who don’t always get a chance.”

That sense of responsibility also shapes how the Collective sees its role in the wider city. “Anytime you expand, it’s a gamble,” one admitted. “But this is low risk because the business and creative community around the Gallowgate is growing, and it can only get bigger. We’re determined to grow with it, but in a way that’s connected to the community.

“We get a buzz out of supporting business especially when you hear the stories from people from underrepresented parts of the community, the barriers that they face. We can open doors for people here.”

Glasgow Collective is housed at 15 East Campbell St, Glasgow G1 5DT with a building that faces onto Gallowgate. They offer co-working space in the East End, flexible full-time and part- time hot-desking, dedicated desks, private studios and offices. New space will be available by the end of the year, with the event space set to launch soon. Contact at [email protected].