New Lab’s co-working space is an antidote to the rent-a-desk model that’s sweeping the globe

Shared workspaces have become so ubiquitous in the global urban landscape that WeWork, the defacto face of the movement, now has offices in 12 countries and more than 30 spaces in New York alone. But, in an increasingly crowded market filled with companies like WorkHouse, Projective Space and Ensemble, there’s a new venture in Brooklyn that’s an antidote to the rent-a-desk model that’s sweeping the globe.
Say hello to New Lab: a private working community for hardware manufacturers, particularly in the area of technology, located inside its 84,000 sq-ft former shipyard. 'When we saw this building', says founder David Belt, 'we thought, this is one of the last places in New York where interesting things can happen.'
New Lab’s co-working space in Brooklyn Navy Yard
New Lab resides inside Building 128, the once-fallow monument to machinery’s past, inside the Brooklyn Navy Yard – part of the regeneration of the borough’s proclivity towards making and manufacturing. 'I love Brooklyn. I live in Brooklyn,' says Belt, 'but people tell us if they’re in some maker-space, it’s hard to attract top engineers from MIT or Carnegie Mellon.'
Belt emphatically explains, 'We wanted to build New Lab for this community – for the smartest, brightest people at the top of their game who are also entrepreneurs and are looking into the abyss.' The private workspace is partially funded by the New York City government in an effort to revitalise industry, and not nostalgia of yesteryear’s smoggy industrialised past – as New Lab symbolically and quite literally shows, it’s a clean, forward-thinking future.
The concept for New Lab, explains Belt, stems from 'what’s going on in 3D printing, or what’s happening in other forms of manufacturing, what companies in NYC are building interesting products. Doing hardware in NY in difficult. We can create a public/private partnership and get support from the city and state and tax credit financing.'
Though the project was financially greenlit more than four years ago, it's only now that New Lab has officially opened, after receiving the $35 million private investment it needed to finalise construction and equip the space with state-of-the-art resources, from 3D printers to wood and metal shops, and printing studios.
Currently, 30 or so tenants occupy the space, including Nanotronics, Jason Krugman Studio and Honeybee Robotics – even outspoken 3D industry guru Francis Bitonti has moved in. While it may seem like the secrets of tomorrow are being plotted inside today, as Belt says, 'we like to tell people, "We don’t know what the future is going to look like in the future."' Except that it’ll be made in Brooklyn.
New Lab is an interdisciplinary space designed to support entrepreneurs working in emerging technologies such as robotics, artificial intelligence and connected devices
The Brooklyn Navy Yard hub is a cathedral of manufacturing which includes studios and reserved workspaces, prototyping shops, lounges and open spaces, a cafe and a kitchen, meeting rooms and event rooms, to be shared by everyone working there
INFORMATION
For more information, visit the New Lab website
ADDRESS
63 Flushing Avenue
Building 128
Cumberland Gate
Brooklyn NY 11205
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
Julie Baumgardner is an arts and culture writer, editor and journalist who's spent nearly 15 years covering all aspects of art, design, culture and travel. Julie's work has appeared in publications including Bloomberg, Cultured, Financial Times, New York magazine, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, as well as Wallpaper*. She has also been interviewed for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Miami Herald, Observer, Vox, USA Today, as well as worked on publications with Rizzoli press and spoken at art fairs and conferences in the US, Middle East and Asia. Find her @juliewithab or juliebaumgardnerwriter.com
-
A new Athens gallery is a celebration of old and new, a stone's throw from the Acropolis
New Athens gallery Melas Martinos by Local Local is a contemporary art space, a stone's throw from the Acropolis, in the Greek capital's Monastiraki neighbourhood
-
Haute Couture Week A/W 2025: live updates from the Wallpaper* team
From 7-9 July, Haute Couture Week A/W 2025 arrives in Paris. Follow along for a first look at the shows, presentations and other fashion happenings, as seen by the Wallpaper* editors
-
Boundaries between art and life dissolve in Katherine Hubbard's intimate documentation of her mother's illness
In 'The Great Room', Katherine Hubbard merges caregiving for her mother with an unflinching documentary of the process
-
A Rancho Mirage home is in tune with its location and its architect-owners' passions
Architect Steven Harris and his collaborator and husband, designer Lucien Rees Roberts have built a home in Rancho Mirage, surrounded by some of America’s most iconic mid-century modern works; they invited us on a tour
-
Inside Frank Lloyd Wright’s Laurent House – a project built with accessibility at its heart
The dwelling, which you can visit in Illinois, is a classic example of Wright’s Usonian architecture, and was also built for a client with a disability long before accessibility was widely considered
-
Tour this fire-resilient minimalist weekend retreat in California
A minimalist weekend retreat was designed as a counterpoint to a San Francisco pied-à-terre; Edmonds + Lee Architects’ Amnesia House in Napa Valley is a place for making memories
-
A New Zealand house on a rugged beach exemplifies architect Tom Kundig's approach in rich, yet understated luxury
This coastal home, featured in 'Tom Kundig: Complete Houses', a new book launch in the autumn by Monacelli Press, is a perfect example of its author's approach to understated luxury. We spoke to Tom Kundig, the architect behind it
-
Tour architect Paul Schweikher’s house, a Chicago midcentury masterpiece
Now hidden in the Chicago suburbs, architect Paul Schweikher's former home and studio is an understated midcentury masterpiece; we explore it, revisiting a story from the Wallpaper* archives, first published in April 2009
-
The world of Bart Prince, where architecture is born from the inside out
For the Albuquerque architect Bart Prince, function trumps form, and all building starts from the inside out; we revisit a profile from the Wallpaper* archive, first published in April 2009
-
Is embracing nature the key to a more fire-resilient Los Angeles? These landscape architects think so
For some, an executive order issued by California governor Gavin Newsom does little to address the complexities of living within an urban-wildland interface
-
Hop on this Fire Island Pines tour, marking Pride Month and the start of the summer
A Fire Island Pines tour through the work of architecture studio BOND is hosted by The American Institute of Architects New York in celebration of Pride Month; join the fun