Oxfordshire's business community doesn't stop at the county boundary. Between the science parks along the A34, the university spinouts moving into their first funding rounds, and the number of local founders who split their week between Oxford and the City of London, plenty of people reading this have a stake in what happens sixty miles down the train line. That's the context for a recent opening worth knowing about. In January this year, The Work Project opened its first UK site inside One Leadenhall, a landmark tower in the City of London, and for Oxfordshire's growing pool of London-facing businesses, it's a development worth a closer look.
What's Actually Opened
The Work Project, a coworking and flexible workspace brand founded in Singapore, has taken levels 22 and 23 of One Leadenhall, a striking 35-storey tower next to the historic Leadenhall Market. The fit-out runs to 30,000 square feet and includes offices, lounges and meeting facilities with uninterrupted, 360-degree views across the London skyline. The interiors, designed by Sydney-based studio Farago Han Studio, lean on stone and timber finishes and a residential, hospitality-led feel rather than the more corporate look many coworking spaces default to.
It's the company's first venture outside Asia Pacific, and by the company's own account, One Leadenhall was chosen deliberately as the starting point for a wider push into London.
Why an Oxfordshire Reader Should Care
At first glance this looks like a purely London story. But Oxfordshire's economy is more tied to the City than the geography suggests. Life sciences and deep tech firms clustered around Oxford, Harwell and Milton Park regularly need a London base for investor meetings, client pitches or simply a professional registered address that reads well on a term sheet. Many of these businesses are small enough that a full office lease in the City makes little sense, yet frequent enough visitors to London that a hot desk in a coffee shop doesn't quite cut it either.
That's the gap flexible, premium coworking spaces are built to fill, and it's part of why a new, well-specified option opening in the Square Mile is relevant reading for founders based well outside it. Founder and chief executive Junny Lee has said the London site was designed to match the standards that established businesses already expect from their own client relationships, which is exactly the bar an Oxfordshire firm meeting City investors or insurers would want its own workspace to clear.
Anyone who has tried to arrange a pitch meeting or an investor update while based in Oxfordshire knows the usual workarounds. A borrowed meeting room from a friendly contact, a hotel lobby that isn't quite private enough, or a long detour to a serviced office on the wrong side of town. None of these are disasters, but they do shape the first impression a London contact forms of a business that is, on every other measure, perfectly capable of competing with firms based permanently in the capital.
Who This Is Actually For
The obvious audience is Oxfordshire's science and technology cluster, but it isn't limited to that. Professional services firms, consultancies and even creative agencies based around Oxford increasingly need an occasional London presence to stay close to clients who expect it. A premium, well-located address that can be used for a day, a week or a rolling membership sits in a useful middle ground between a full lease and no London footprint at all.
The Commute Question
For anyone weighing whether their business needs a foothold in London at all, the practical case has changed less than people assume. Oxford to London Paddington remains under an hour by train, and a City address is a different proposition again from a West End or Canary Wharf one when your client base sits among banks, insurers and asset managers, the sectors that have made up much of the early take-up at One Leadenhall since it opened.
For an Oxfordshire business that meets City clients even occasionally, the calculation isn't really about relocating. It's about having somewhere appropriate to land for the day, take a call, or host a meeting that doesn't feel out of place next to the people you're meeting with.
The Bigger Picture
This isn't intended as a one-off outpost either. The Work Project has set out plans for a much larger UK footprint, targeting close to 400,000 square feet across the City and West End by 2030, alongside further sites in similarly prominent buildings. Since opening, the Leadenhall space has already reached around 60 percent occupancy, with tenants concentrated in insurance, banking, private equity and technology.
For Oxfordshire's founders, scientists-turned-entrepreneurs and small teams that increasingly do business between the county and the capital, that scale of ambition is worth keeping an eye on. More premium, well-located options in the City generally mean more flexibility for smaller, out-of-town businesses that need a London presence without a London-sized commitment.
In Short
Oxfordshire's business community has always had one foot in London, whether that's a spinout chasing its Series A or a consultancy that meets clients in the City each week. A well-specified new option like this, arriving with a clear plan to expand rather than a single quiet launch, is the kind of development worth filing away for the next time a London meeting is on the calendar.
