Space by Stansons · 2026-07-21 · 20 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
43 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
Together is positioned as a hospitality-driven integrated event business rather than traditional co-working, handling everything from catering and AV to branding for clients hosting 300-500 person conferences. The 88 Wood Street venue, housed in a Richard Rogers-designed building, books 300+ days in advance and hosts roughly 2,000 delegates per week across Tuesday-Thursday. Elliott emphasizes human-first design decisions: a £300,000 air handling unit with CO2 sensors prevents cognitive drowsiness when rooms fill; Swiss-made coffee machines at £30,000+ signal premium experience; acoustically treated Bolon flooring reduces fatigue from standing all day; and the food philosophy - inspired by Yotam Ottolenghi's 'brain food' concept - ensures delegates feel energized rather than collapsed post-lunch. The space itself, with natural light on multiple sides, flexible demountable walls, an integrated kitchen with four full-time chefs, AV booths staffed by Together engineers, and a theatrical arrival experience via a yellow-featured walkway, eliminates the underground-office feeling many conference venues create. Quarterback designed and built the space as equity partners, not contractors, ensuring detail-obsessed execution. For corporate organizers, banks, law firms, private equity, and media companies (recent clients include Amazon, Accenture, Fremantle, and Simon Cowell), this model removes vendor fragmentation and guarantees operational coherence.
Together is a hospitality business that sells integrated big meeting and event spaces, not bedrooms or desk rentals. It includes full kitchens, culinary teams, AV booths, AV engineers, and handles all logistics, branding, and service in-house for corporate events of 300-500 people.
Together's booking model is roughly: the number of delegates equals the number of days in advance. For example, a 300-person event is typically booked 300 days in advance. The space is forward-sold every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday for the year, except August when it undergoes maintenance and furniture cleaning.
Together invests in a £300,000 air handling unit with CO2 sensors on walls that automatically double oxygen levels when carbon dioxide rises, preventing the drowsiness that occurs when 300-500 people occupy an enclosed space. They also use premium 'brain food' inspired by Yotam Ottolenghi's philosophy, which nourishes rather than induces post-lunch fatigue.
Quarterback, an equity investor and partner in Together, designed, built, and delivered the space. They function as owners rather than contractors, which Elliott credits with the obsessive attention to detail throughout the venue.
Mondays are used for intensive prep: the culinary team preps all food for the week, furniture is organized, and everything is staged for Tuesday-Thursday operations. Clients book conferences Tuesday-Thursday because those are peak business days; Mondays see almost no client events.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
The episode is primarily a physical tour with surface-level observations about design choices rather than substantive business insights. While specific details like £30,000 coffee machines and £300,000 air handling units are mentioned, there's minimal exploration of underlying business principles, operational strategy, or learnings that would transfer to other contexts. Most commentary amounts to 'we invested in X to improve experience,' without deeper analysis of ROI, tradeoffs, or strategic reasoning.
They're Swiss made. They're almost a, uh, smidge over £30,000 each. There's an 18 month waiting list for them and the quality is just incredible.
It's akin to running a hotel. So we've got 10 full time operational members of staff in here. Yesterday we brought 18 additional temporary staff to help us run the service.
The concepts presented - human-centered design, natural light importance, operational efficiency, integrated service delivery - are well-established design and hospitality principles. The framing as 'human first' is generic corporate language. There is no contrarian perspective, first-principles reasoning, or novel business model insight. The episode reads as a branded property tour rather than original thinking about conferences or event spaces.
The business approach is to deliver. We're a human first business.
We partnered with Quarterback, we put these beautiful peepholes into the room so nobody would enter from outside of the room if something is happening.
Elliott Sparsis is the founder of Together, an operating event venue business, which provides legitimate practitioner credibility. However, the episode format - a physical tour with scripted commentary - severely limits the depth of expertise extraction. He speaks from operational/design perspective rather than demonstrating deep business acumen, strategy, or sector insights. Suitable for a venue tour; limited for executive-level B2B learning.
Yeah, Together is think uh, of us like a hospitality business. We're very similar to a hotel business. We don't sell bedrooms, we sell big meetings and event spaces and we have all of the infrastructure built into our space.
We are forward sold every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday for this year, forward sold. With the exception of August.
The transcript contains concrete numbers: 2,000 delegates per week, 500-person capacity, £30,000 coffee machines, £300,000 air handling unit, 18-month waiting lists, 15-minute cloakroom throughput, 4 full-time chefs, forward-booked Tuesday-Thursday all year. However, these are primarily infrastructure costs and operational metrics rather than business results (revenue, margins, growth, customer acquisition costs). Missing: financial performance, client retention rates, pricing strategy, competitive positioning, or market data.
So the number of delegates a space is booked out that many days in advance. So 300 capacities. Crudely booked 300 days in advance.
This week alone. This is Friday. We've had about 2,000 people through this space this week alone.
The host asks largely logistical and descriptive questions ('What is that?', 'Who are you taking?', 'Show us where...') that prompt recitation rather than probing. There are no follow-ups that challenge claims, explore constraints, or dig into strategic decisions. No productive disagreement or tension. The format is a guided tour with softball prompts, not an interview designed to extract business learning. The host occasionally adds observations but rarely pushes back or asks 'why' questions.
Just before we go into this room, I want to point out that you'll see branding everywhere. Um, and that changes. So I'm going to ask Elliot about that as well because that's always moving.
But what's different between your vision and what has actually come to pass? Is there any differences?
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
Subscribe to Show Notes for more from Space by Stansons at This week on Space by Stansons , Guy visits Together to explore how thoughtful design can completely transform the way people experience meetings, conferences and events. Joined by founder Elliott Sparsis , the conversation uncovers why Together sees itself as a hospitality business rather than a traditional venue. Elliott explains how every detail has been designed around the people using the space, from natural light, flexible layouts and seamless wayfinding to air quality, acoustics and food that keeps delegates energised throughout the day. As they tour the venue, Guy and Elliott discuss what it means to create a truly human-first environment, why wellbeing should be at the heart of workplace and event design, and how spaces that prioritise comfort and experience can lead to better conversations, stronger engagement and more meaningful connections. Whether you’re designing workplaces, planning events or simply interested in the relationship between people and space, this episode offers practical insights into the details that make the biggest difference.
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Speaker A: So I'm going into 88 Wood street to meet Elliot, the founder of Together, um, an event like space. I'm kind of asking loads of questions about it, but let's go. Come with me. It's got just so much like theatrical feel to it. It's got the plants, um, here, right. So come through here. But the lifts are through there. But I'm just going to show you the like, kind of reception area to start with. So they've got this huge table, this nice soft seating, live herbs growing, these curtains. I mean it's just so stunning and loads of natural light. It feels very exciting. And then we come to the lifts. So before we even enter their space, we're on this walk bridge with these like yellow features. And then we're looking back over this space here which I showed you downstairs. So take a look over there. It's a really kind of exciting being walking across this footbridge. And then we actually arrive into the space here which is just like. Yeah. And that is it. So let's go and find Elliot and we will chat to him. Three years after we've started this podcast, we thought it was time to make sure that those lessons and the takeaways from our amazing guests were actually actionable,
Speaker B: something you can really put into place, something. So we have launched Show Notes, a bi weekly email. Get into your inbox and that will give you the key headlines that uh, is indexable, findable, actionable. We can really start to make a difference in creating healthy, happy workspaces. So the links below or you can head to stansons.co.uk space. Look forward to seeing you sign up, Elliot.
Speaker A: Thank you so much. Pleasure Space by Stansons. Um, we're here, 88 Wood street at together with Elliot and like literally I've just had my first glimpse of the space. Mind blowing. You're going to love it. So come on this journey with us, Elliot. Together. What is that as opposed to a co working space?
Speaker C: Yeah, Together is think uh, of us like a hospitality business. We're very similar to a hotel business. We don't sell bedrooms, we sell big meetings and event spaces and we have all of the infrastructure built into our space. Large kitchens, culinary teams, AV booths, AV engineers, and we're a full integrated big meeting and event business.
Speaker A: Wicked. And what is it that makes like from meetings, events? What sort of clients are we talking about? That sort of thing. Who are you taking this space?
Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, there's a real range. We have a lot of media clients. So we had Fremantle in our space a Couple of weeks ago at a production house behind America's Got Talent and X Factor, Simon Cowell was in here giving a keynote conversation. On the other spectrum, we have a lot of the banks, the law firms, the private equity businesses in here having big off sites, bringing 3, 4, 500 of their clients into our space for multiple day events.
Speaker A: Amazing. And so how far in advance would this space be booked out for?
Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, very crudely. The number of delegates a space is booked out that many days in advance.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker C: So 300 capacities. Crudely booked 300 days in advance. Think about it like that as an easier way of looking at. So we've got real sight lines in terms of what our book looks like. Ah, what our diary looks like, how many delegates are coming through the space. Uh, this week alone. This is Friday. We've had about 2,000 people through this space this week alone. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. So high volume. We do pretty much all of our business Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Fridays. Mondays are very quiet. So it's an interesting business to run for sure.
Speaker A: Amazing. I said that's nuts. You're basically booked up to the end of the year.
Speaker C: We are forward sold every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday for this year, forward sold. With the exception of August. We do no business in August. Uh, but we send all our furniture away to get cleaned and beached. And we repaint everywhere.
Speaker A: And speaking of clothes, not just close the business. Okay. Wicked. And right. So you can see why this is booked up for a year. Let's go. Show us where Simon Cowell was.
Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. M. Come with me. So this area where we are now is called the gallery. This is where we serve breakfast and lunch. A client has their arrival experience. We focus a lot on the experience of just the quality of coffee machines. There's snacks that clients can help themselves to. So when a delegate or when a client comes in, they buy everything for a minimum of a day. So they're here for a full day. So we want to try and make that experience as high as possible for them. So we made a big investment in these coffee machines. They're Swiss made. They're almost a, uh, smidge over £30,000 each. There's an 18 month waiting list for them and the quality is just incredible. They can obviously help themselves to drinks and things like that. And then we have these drawers. Please take a peek. It's kind, uh, of suggestive, but, yeah, there's snacks and things that clients can come in and help themselves to. And it just really improves that experience of clients being in here all day. Uh, and just gives them little touch points that they can enjoy.
Speaker A: Yeah, amazing. And so this gallery space is generally where like breakfast to serve.
Speaker C: Exactly. So these large credenzas here are what we serve breakfast and lunch on. Yeah, buffet style. Typically, yeah. That said, we did have a big plated lunch and dinner last night. We had 400 people in here, plated dinner. We had 18 temp labor temp staff coming in. But typically, yeah, it's buffet style format of a day. Typically client comes in, registers, has a buffet, uh, breakfast. They then move their three or four hundred delegates into our largest room in here which is a maximum capacity of 500 people.
Speaker A: Just before we go into this room, I want to point out that you'll see branding everywhere. Um, and that changes. So I'm going to ask Elliot about that as well because that's always moving. Um, it's just so flexible. Oh my gosh, look at this space. This is amazing.
Speaker C: Yeah. So come in. This is our biggest room. It's actually just been turned from a big plate of dinner we have yesterday. But maximum capacity of 500 people. This is London's biggest integrated LED wall. 9 meters by 3 meters. And just gives our clients real impact. It's immersive. They can really bring the experience alive of bringing 500 people into a room. This room had 500 people exactly yesterday. Yes. So yesterday we had a seated, ah, lunch in here, 500 people with then presentations happening. We had Accenture and Amazon were in here. So it was an exciting day for us yesterday.
Speaker A: I bet. And so this is quite flexible though. This can change if it's not this much space is needed.
Speaker C: Exactly. So it's about 5,000 square feet column free, full 4 meter floor to ceiling heights, one room, maximum capacity of 500. But then we've got the ability of dividing this room into three. So we've got two demountable acoustically treated air walls slide out, allow uh, our clients to then cut this room into three. So it's very typical for a client to have 500 people in here in the morning and break for lunch. We put the airwalls out. They then have three different breakout sessions with three different services happening in those rooms.
Speaker A: Some of the logistics, the dynamics, how do you handle that? You have an on site team as we mentioned.
Speaker C: It's akin to running a hotel. So we've got 10 full time operational members of staff in here. Yesterday we brought 18 additional temporary staff to help us run the service. So it's, yeah, it's uh, a high operating process.
Speaker A: Is there any Other room like this in London?
Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, this is the first room in London with an integrated LED wall of this size. So above ground, tons of natural light. Our business plan is never to go underground. Clients are in here all day. That sense of, well, being with natural light is really important for us. So we are in architecturally interesting buildings. This building is incredible. It's a Richard Rogers built building, timeless in its architecture. So our clients, their experience starts the minute they come in that front door. They're in a Richard Rogers building. It's an interesting space. You feel like you're somewhere where you're going to enjoy rather than going into an office where you're potentially going underground with no natural light.
Speaker A: Yeah, no, you touched on natural light. I think that's so important, especially if people are in a conference for like a long period of time or they've got the thing for the whole day. Any other ways that you keep people, like, alert and like.
Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, we made a big investment on what's called an air handling unit. So the minute you put three or four hundred people into a big room, the carbon dioxide doubles very quickly. People then get drowsy. So we have CO2 sensors that are on the wall. The minute the carbon dioxide gets past a certain level, the air handling unit kicks in, doubles the oxygen in our large room, keeps people awake, keeps people aware. And it's the same that, uh, casinos put in to their spaces. So it's purely pumping oxygen in.
Speaker A: I love the consideration for people's, like, well being. Thought about all of that in a healthy way. Um, quite literally. I mean, what a beautiful room. Like. Yeah, I've never seen. Yeah, I've never seen points.
Speaker C: But we partnered with Quarterback, we put these beautiful peepholes into the room so nobody would enter from outside of the room if something is happening. So you can have a look before you come in. So we think about the whole flow of trying to deliver the best experience for our clients when they're in here.
Speaker A: So Quarterback designed us and delivered it.
Speaker C: Very much so.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker C: So Quarterback are one of our big investors. They designed it, they built it, they delivered it for us. So they act like owners, um, founders of the business. They're not just a contractor that's coming in. They actually really have a career.
Speaker A: Yeah. I think you can tell that the level of detail feels like someone's. It's like someone's baby. Not just completely.
Speaker C: Very much so.
Speaker A: Very much so. It's very nice. This flooring is nice as well.
Speaker C: It's got like a nice yeah, no, the floor's incredible. So the flooring here is really tough for us to get it right. Yeah, we have, as I said, about 2,000 people that have come through the door this week. We serve breakfast and lunch in this area. We had drinks, receptions. There's red wine on the floor, there's food. So tiles are really hard for your feet if you're standing on tiles all day. Typically get aching feet at the end of the day, particularly for women if they're wearing high heels. This is acoustically treated bolon, so it's soft but it cleans really easily. But the acoustic element also allows us to absorb the noise. And we've got 500 people in here. It's a nice environment to be with quarterback. We've really tried to think about the experience, the flow. When you have 400 people in a room, you really got to think about how it operates.
Speaker A: And just for the audience following, if you're watching on Spotify or Apple, do head over to YouTube and you'll be able to actually pick, pick up these details in video form.
Speaker C: You find here is, yeah, is our air handling unit. Uh, it's about £300,000 investment for us to put in. That's net lettable area. You're paying rent rate, service charge on that. But it's fundamentally important to improve the experience of our delegates within the space. And yeah, so designed a big cloak room. Our clients check in at the reception desk here. They then flow around onto the cloak room. It opens right up. We can get five cloakroom attendants in there. Uh, we can move 500 people through there in 15 minutes. Then at the end of the day we have five cloakroom tenants. We can move people out really, really quickly. We'll try to think about just the speed of service, of clients coming in and then beautiful stance, uh, curtains as well. Exactly.
Speaker A: Yeah. Enjoy. Yeah, no, that's great. It's amazing. So people can be using that space. They might then be stopping for a lunch in this gallery area doing their thing. And then how would this space.
Speaker C: Exactly.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker C: So then this is a super flexible room. So it's called the collective. Beautiful square, natural light on three sides. You can see there's two drop down projectors that are there at the moment. But actually a client can use this as part of the gallery area for breakfast and lunch. These projectors disappear. So flexibility is everything. All of our clients want to use the space in a very different way. So last week we had 300 people in here. We closed that acoustically treated wall. We set up A stage and a lectern for our client. They have a private auditorium space, but this week it's been used open plan as part of the gallery space. Because there are so many people in the main room, flexibility is really key.
Speaker A: I saw there was a booth, AV booth in the other big hall. So what?
Speaker C: So, yeah, another AV booth. We fully integrate everything into our space. We have two AV engineers in here that will drive the presentation on behalf of our client. The AV engineers are together staff. Everything is integrated. Our clients don't transact with different vendors. They transact only with. Together, only with our team. It's really important for us to give that sense of confidence to our clients that we're controlling the food, the av, all of the technology, the service. It's sort of a true integrated offer that we offer.
Speaker A: And do you handle the branding as well?
Speaker C: Very much so, yeah. So yesterday we had a, uh, AI business that had Amazon and Accenture as their main sponsors. Click. Were running the event. They had 400 people in here and they've branded everything like you see. So we handle the branding in house. Absolutely. And, uh, we're think of us a.
Speaker A: A blank canvas.
Speaker C: This space is our client space. When they come in, they can brand as much as they want. They can organize and relay out the space however they want. It's very much their space on the. The days that they're in here. Green room in here. So the green room is for the client. The organizer, uh, can also be a mother's room or a prayer room. So it has that flexibility, but it's just a. Yeah, private space for the organizer to work out of.
Speaker A: Now. It's got that very clean, like any. I can see how anyone's brand new fits in here.
Speaker C: Yeah, very clean, very neutral. And that's, uh, the. I mean, you make an interesting point. There's a real fine line between interior design and going too far and colliding with our client's brand. Right. Our clients come in, we're a blank canvas for them. So the quarterback process was we want it to feel very neutral, but have an element of design in it where it's not branded. It still feels like it's a beautiful space to be.
Speaker A: Yeah, I was going to say because the fine line is it you don't want it to feel bland or insipid or lacking character or soul. But it's definitely got that like, uh, walking around here. Hopefully this is picked up on the camera. But it does really have that kind of energy completely.
Speaker C: That's all. Yeah. Cherie Falconer from quarterback brought our vision to life. So this is all back of house so our clients don't come down here. This is where all of our culinary happens. So we've got an integrated kitchen. This is our, uh, head of operations, our head chef.
Speaker A: Well, we respect you for everything that you do.
Speaker C: Fully integrated kitchen designed in a way where the chefs have a ton of natural light overlooking the gardens. As I said, We've done 2,000 covers this week alone out of this kitchen. Designed with a big walk in fridge that gives us flexibility. Monday is a big prep day for clients. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. And it allows us to have really organized prep days on Monday. Everything lives in here for the week and then we're hyper organized. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, four full time chefs in here. So this is an m important element for us to be super organized.
Speaker A: Yes, I can see that. Like just a chef getting the food in and out. I'm loving their dishes.
Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, no, we spent, we spent a big investment on all these, uh, and all of these big things. Oh, uh, it's, yeah, kind of look and feel. Presentation is everything with food. Right. It's gotta look. Eat with your eyes. Very much so.
Speaker A: I mean, it's amazing m that there's
Speaker C: no flaws at all.
Speaker A: But what's different between your vision and what has actually come to pass? Is there any differences?
Speaker C: Yeah, I think we've been amazed at, uh, the sense of natural light. We were a little concerned, particularly this big air handling unit, because behind here is all natural light that we've built and blocked up. So we were a little nervous initially. Are we removing too much of the natural light and it's going to feel too dark. But actually we've been blown away by, by the sense of natural light and how it feels.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker C: We love the flow of the gallery into the big room. Our clients don't have to go down corridors. Upstairs, downstairs. The flow of breakfast into the big room and back out is really clean and really important for our clients. The arrival experience, we've been blown away by the walk bridge. Adds a layer of theater. When you're arriving into an event, you walk over the walking bridge. As you've seen today, these guys have branded all of our glass double doors. So the experience of the delegates start when they come over that bridge. You feel like you're arriving into something interesting. So the building is doing a lot of hard work for us. It's Richard Rogers building, as we said, and it's just architecturally interesting to look at from lots of different angles.
Speaker A: Yeah. Even look at yeah. And the arrival and the reception area is lovely. Everything's considered when you're doing your next space, what would you do differently? Good.
Speaker C: Uh, question. What would we do differently? I think we would probably build more flexibility into the big room in terms of being able to subdivide it into multiple breakout rooms. We've got a lot of clients that one big room in the morning, but then want 6, 7, 8, 10 breakout rooms in the afternoon. So we've got the ability of having four breakout rooms here, but we're seeing a lot of demand for big room morning, as I said, and then, yeah, multiple breakout rooms in the afternoon. So more flexibility, I think, in the next site is key.
Speaker A: Yeah. Amazing. And what's the most common feedback you get when people come here?
Speaker C: Food. Everybody takes pictures of the food, sends us feedback on the food. So we work really hard with our head chef to deliver something that visually looks amazing but makes you feel good after you consumed it as well.
Speaker A: Right.
Speaker C: It's really important for us to feed our delegates with food that's going to make them feel good in the afternoon. You don't want to eat lunch, go into an auditorium for a conference, and then, uh, collapse in terms of become drowsy because you've eaten the wrong food. So we've been inspired by Jotar Motulenghi. His approach is brain food. So food that makes you feel good after you've consumed it. So we've worked very hard on the food tasting good, looking good, but also making you feel good in the afternoon. So the food is overwhelmingly the biggest feedback that we get from our clients.
Speaker A: What I'm loving about this space, which I think more people can be considering, is natural light has been done, oxygen's been done, food's been done. The navigation, how you move through it, like whether you're in a wheelchair, whether you're on feet, everything is very seamless, it's very easy. And that's what I just think is giving us, like, very wholesome, almost like at peace. You feel very safe here, very calm, very prepared to sort of digest information.
Speaker C: The business approach is to deliver. And you've almost summarized what we want. We're a human first. Business. Right. And what does human first mean? It can mean whatever you want it to mean, but ultimately it's to provide a space where people feel comfortable, people feel relaxed.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker C: Conferences are a difficult environment. Right. People feel anxious. So if we can help a delegate to be relaxed in a conference environment, then they'll get more out of the day. And the experience that they have. So we are a human first business. We've thought about that really hard in everything we do. And you've just really eloquently summarized hopefully what that human first element means.
Speaker A: Yeah, no, you can totally see it and feel it. Thank you, Elliot. Really appreciate you showing us around, seeing the space. It is phenomenal. Um, love your vision. Love to see where you're going next. The next space as you open up. Yeah. And the next guest you have in.
Speaker C: Absolutely. We'll have to follow our journey. Venue 2, 3, 4. Yeah, we've got something exciting bubbling up on the top floor that will open in September, so.
Speaker A: Amazing. Come back in there.
Speaker C: And, uh, we've got a few other things in the pipeline.
Speaker A: Exciting indeed. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Take care.
Speaker C: Thank you.
Speaker B: I find it simply fascinating how things. Physical space can totally change how we think, feel and behave. Meaning it can pause distractions, it can connect us, it can mean we do our very best work. And that's where Stanson's steps in this show is created by Stansons, who design, make and install curtains and acoustics to create the perfect environment for people. So flourish and do their very best work. You've got a project on. We know how it feels. Reach out and we'll start to talk.
