How to Find the Right Part of London for Your Office

We all know that London is one of the world’s best locations for an office. It gives your business access to top talent, unrivalled connectivity and increased credibility, and puts you within easy reach of lots of lucrative clients. There are also an enormous number of coworking and serviced offices to choose from. But where in this city full of opportunities should your business call home?

Every area of London is different in terms of the local amenities, the general vibe, the cost of office space and even the industries it best serves. With flexible working practices now underpinning many businesses’ strategies, choosing an office in an appealing location — and with an easy commute — can play a big part in drawing your teams back to the workplace.

With that in mind, we’re going to take a look at some of the best office locations in London and discuss the factors to consider when choosing an area that’s the right fit for you and your team.

Think About Where Talent Is Congregated

Many areas of London have become hubs for specific industries, where businesses in similar sectors set up and operate. In many cases, this is due to the availability of talent in the area and the balance between employee experience and budget. Similar firms can also work with one another and trade services between themselves, which is why they tend to cluster together.

Here’s a quick breakdown of where businesses in different industries tend to be based:

City of London — Finance, legal and insurance

The City of London is the financial centre of the UK and Europe and is home to many FTSE 100 businesses. The area is renowned for being London’s historic financial district, with many of the world’s largest financial institutions calling the area home.

And with the financial industry comes legal and insurance, and businesses across all three industries find themselves right at home in the City.

Canary Wharf — Finance, insurance and tech

The area of Canary Wharf is another financial powerhouse and is the most prominent finance hub after the City of London. However, the balance is starting to shift towards tech firms, with tech giants like Intel, Oracle and Revolut also setting up in the area.

While Canary Wharf has traditionally been serviced by the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) and the Jubilee Line, the recent opening of the Elizabeth Line now connects the city-within-a-city with commuter towns as far as Reading, Abbey Wood and Essex.

Shoreditch — Tech and fintech

If we’re going talk about tech then we have to profile Shoreditch. Buoyed by startups looking for cheap office space in 2018, Shoreditch, with its Silicon Roundabout, has become the city’s premier tech location, hosting businesses such as Deliveroo, Amazon and Monzo.

Whitechapel — Creative, gaming and media

London’s expanding technology and creative sector, coupled with rent increases in Shoreditch, has seen a wealth of innovative startups set up in the E1 area. Whitechapel is also well-known for its food and arts scene as well as its cultural diversity, which has attracted a number of businesses to the area.

Transport links to Whitechapel and nearby Aldgate have also improved to cater to the growing demand and new business hub, with the Elizabeth Line now servicing Whitechapel, joining the London Overground, District, and Hammersmith and City Lines.

Soho — Creative, arts, and media

As well as being one of London’s key entertainment districts, Soho is also a thriving business hub in its own right. It’s home to music and film giants like EMI, 20th Century Fox and Sony, along with many top advertising firms.

King’s Cross & Euston — Tech, health and science

A £3bn investment has transformed King’s Cross into one of London’s biggest success stories. Boosted by the King’s Cross and St Pancras railways stations, it’s now home to tech giants like Google and Facebook, while further down Euston Road you’ll find many science and medical institutions.

Farringdon & Clerkenwell — Creative and tech

Farringdon and Clerkenwell, situated in the fashionable borough of Islington, are among the top areas in London for creative and tech startups. With Shoreditch’s Silicon Roundabout just down the road, and a cluster of universities to link up with, it’s a great area to build connections and grow your business.

The local university campuses and colleges provide you with a local pool of great talent, with graduates ready to be hired straight from school, armed with the latest industry knowledge and skills. Locating your business in this area means you’ll be right there when students start looking for part-time or graduate positions.

Think About Your Business Image

The idea that image is everything is an age-old trope but, in business, image matters. Being in a prestigious area can help you attract top talent and bigger clients, and become the foundation of a destination workplace.

When choosing office space to rent in London, you should always consider the image you want to convey and what you want your clients to think when visiting the area. Choosing an area with a prestigious, traditional, postcode can add a sense of legitimacy and a premium feel to the brand. This can be particularly helpful if you provide professional services, such as marketing, legal and other high-value-added services.

Think About the Local Transport Links

When choosing the best location for your office, the transport links in the area should be at the forefront of your mind. You might think that with working trends shifting towards more remote and home working, good transport links are less important than before the pandemic. However, the opposite is true. When office-based working was the norm, your team had no choice but to travel to the office, regardless of the commute. Now more and more people are working from home, you have to give your team a reason to travel to the office, and an easy commute can play a big part in that.

Proximity to mainline and underground stations is a must, while good bus routes provide more options for your team. Offices near stations with connections to Heathrow and London City Airport are also a consideration if you regularly travel internationally or have overseas clients.

The new Elizabeth Line is also something to look out for. It runs east to west across the capital through stations in Paddington, Marylebone, Farringdon, Liverpool Street, Whitechapel, Bond Street and Canary Wharf. It opens up what were, in some cases, quite hard-to-reach locations.

As well as transport links to and from the office, it’s also worth considering how walkable the area is. If employees are going to make the effort to commute to the office, they want to be within easy reach of amenities they don’t have at home. That’s why the walkability of shops, cafes, bars, restaurants and green spaces can become a major recruitment and retention tool.

Think About What Your Current Office Location Lacks

There are all sorts of reasons to find a new office location. One of the most common is that you outgrow your current office physically and need more space without increasing your costs. However, outgrowing a workplace isn’t simply down to your headcount. It can also come down to the type of organisation that you want to build and the employees and clients you want to attract. For example, if your employees, clients and peers are concentrated in an area such as Canary Wharf or the City of London, should you relocate there, too?

Equally, if your business’s success relies on getting your employees together in the office more often, should you move to a location with better transport links? Having better transport links can widen your talent catchment area, making it easier to find and hire the best people.

Alternatively, you may want to move to a different working model. If your current office provides a dedicated desk for every worker, you might choose to move to a hybrid working model. You can then reduce your ratio of desks per employee and look for a smaller office in a more prestigious location.

Find Your New London Office Space With Knight Frank

Wherever you want to base your business, let us do the hard work for you. At Knight Frank, we offer flexible office space across London. Just tell us what you’re looking for, let us arrange your viewings and we’ll negotiate on your behalf to get you the best deal. And better still, our service is completely free. Get in touch to discuss your requirements with our team.