Four months after our first project initiative, we’re continuing with the same intention – to showcase some of the best colivings in Spain and inspire you to jump into the coliving movement.
First stop in our second, Fall, initiative, and 6th stop overall, and we’re back on the Canaries. This time, we’re exploring one of the favorite islands for digital nomads – Gran Canaria. And none less than its capital – Las Palmas, all thanks to Coliving 1907.
We’re lucky to explore this amazing city through Coliving 1907 because the owner and the host, Raquel Villalobos Vega is a true local, and on top of knowing all the tips and secrets of the city, she makes sure that the coliving is very well connected to the digital nomad community.
If you’re longing for a place where you could stay for a few months, enjoy nice weather, meet a lot of amazing people, and learn so many new things, Coliving 1907 in Las Palmas is a perfect choice.
Need more persuasion? Read our experience below. 🙂
Disclaimer: This piece of content may contain some affiliate links. If you decide to make a purchase or book through one of our links, we may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you.
Las Palmas – a city where nomads and locals cohabitate
Las Palmas is one of the most vibrant cities in the Canaries. With not many regular tourists, it’s a perfect spot where digital nomads and slow travelers cohabitate with the locals. The dynamics of the city make it even more attractive for slowmads as they can balance between the local culture and interacting with other nationalities.
If you come to Las Palmas, it is practically impossible not to meet someone, not make friends, or feel alone. Along with the vibrant life, the weather in Las Palmas is one of the nicest in the Canaries with temperatures being between 20 and 27 degrees throughout the year and with little or no wind.
This place gives off a perfect mix between island life and metropolitan so it is good for those who love nature, surfing, and adventure, as well for those who like commodities, big city life, and socializing events.
Coliving 1907 is located in the city’s old town – Triana. A bit further away from the beach (further meaning 30 minutes by foot or 10 minutes by bus), Triana is the local center of Las Palmas, with gorgeous cobblestone streets, tall antique buildings with ornaments and wooden gates and tons of local coffee shops and restaurants with traditional and affordable offerings.
How to get to Coliving 1907
To come to Las Palmas, you can either come by plane from the mainland or by plane or ferry from another island.
Ferry to Las Palmas
If you’re coming by ferry, you can go directly to Las Palmas. The port is located in La Isleta, the most northern part of the city. From there, you can take a free ferry bus that will take you to Santa Catalina park which is 5 minutes from the bus stop and the central bus station.
Coliving 1907 is located a bit further in the city, where the old town is – in the neighborhood called Triana. This is about an hour’s walk from where the ferry bus will leave you or a 10-minute bus ride from the Santa Catalina bus stops.
When you get off the ferry bus, cross the road/bridge and go straight forward until you see lots of bus stops. You will need to take bus number 17 which will stop at the first bus stop. The ticket price for one ride is fixed for every in-city ride and will cost you 1.40 euros.
Plane to Las Palmas
The airport is about a 20-30 bus ride from the coliving. There are different buses that you can take from the airport. All of them will bring you to the same bus station – San Telmo.
Once you get off the bus, the coliving will be just 5 minutes walking from there, two streets above and parallel to Triana street.
The space
Coliving 1907 is a beautiful family house from – yes, you guessed it – 1907. The building is what takes this coliving experience to another level with its authentic Spanish vibrations.
Even though patios (stone gardens or atriums with open skylights in the center of the building) are something thought to be typical for Andalusia or Latin America, they can be found all over Spain and they’re often closely connected to Spanish culture.
In Las Palmas, at least in the old town around Triana, you can spot these gorgeous houses with patios on every step. There is something magical about them because when you open the doors of a building, instead of a boring hallway, you are welcomed with this spacious, colorful oasis, and it feels like you’ve encountered a secret world.
And just like its neighboring buildings, Coliving 1907 also has this secret world inside of it which adds to the atmosphere and makes you feel a bit like royalty. Lucky for you, we’ll give you a glance into this secret world today. Let’s take a tour. 🙂
Patio
As soon as you enter Escritor Benito Perez Galdos street, in front of this cute little coffee shop, and through a high wooden door, the patio will open up to you. You will walk through a small, beautifully decorated hallway and a black gate with the year 1907 written in the iron.
The next thing that will catch your attention will be a tall palm tree in the center of the patio, surrounded by dozens of other colorful pots and plants. If you wish to enjoy the peace and breathe in the view, you can take a seat at one of two yellow sitting corners and take your time before going upstairs.
Even though this patio can be the perfect place for gatherings and events, currently, it serves more as this peaceful oasis for colivers to come and join a bit of silence and daydreaming. The only reason for this is that the coliving already has another communal area for gatherings and events, but we’ll get to that later. 🙂
With an open skylight, decorative tiles, and a garden-like feeling, it’s a perfect spot for reading a book, writing a journal, or sharing a pot of tea with another coliver over a light conversation. Oh – and, of course, for taking photos! 😀
If you’ve taken enough time to enjoy the patio, let’s get into a celebrity mood and take the red-carpeted stairs up to the first floor to explore the interior.
The interior
As soon as you walk up the stairs, you will be welcomed by a hallway that goes into a circle around the patio. Whichever way you take – left or right – you will come to your destination.
This floor is a perfect mix of antique and modern – with dark wooden floors, tall ceilings, and big windows looking at the patio and the palm tree.
This floor takes up the majority of the interior of the house and can be split into 3 areas – kitchen and dining area, chillout zone, and the rooms.
Let’s start with the rooms as one of the most important factors when choosing a coliving.
Rooms
Coliving 1907 has 8 private rooms, single and double. All rooms are named after a specific area in Gran Canaria, which is thoughtfully presented on a minimalist map in front of each room.
The inside decoration of the rooms also follows these names and have colors, paintings, or other decoration that hints at or reminds of the area.
Seven rooms are on the first floor, and one is on the patio. Two rooms share the bathroom and others are private – some inside the room, and some outside.
We stayed on the first floor in room Mogan, inspired by a charming fisherman village in Gran Canaria. To match the name, there were a lot of sea-inspired decorations like a blue wall, a golden dolphin piece, a calming painting of the fish underwater, and other blue details.
Except that, all the rooms on the first floor have a huge, two-meter-tall window looking out onto the street. Some of the rooms also come with a private balcony.
A valuable feature that you will find in the rooms is the height-adjustable table that you can turn into a standing desk which makes work so much more enjoyable.
Inside community spaces
Other than the rooms, on the first floor, you will also find all the interior community spaces.
The kitchen
On the separate side of the rooms, you will find the kitchen and the community coworking area.
The kitchen is big enough for a few people to prepare their food and even has a table that two, or three people can sit at and eat or prepare food together.
There are two fridges in the kitchen, and every room has its shelf. Both fridges also have a “general” shelf that is used for things that are for everybody.
Sometimes, somebody might put things where they want to share with others, and other times, when a coliver is leaving the house, they can leave here what they can’t bring with them so the food doesn’t get thrown away.
In the kitchen, each room also has its pantry shelf for storing food, and there’s also one general shelf for things that don’t need to be refrigerated.
Indoor coworking area
Besides the kitchen, there is the main indoor community space – a coworking/multifunctional area. It’s a big table with comfy antique-looking chairs with about 10 seats.
Here, you will also find a big vertical mirror and pics of all the current and past colivers.
Lazy area
Lastly, when it comes to indoor common spaces, the first floor also has a comfy lounge area with bean bags and window nooks great for lazier work on your laptop or a cup of coffee in the afternoon.
However, even with lots of space inside for the community to gather, these all places are completely outshined by one particular outdoor space, and one of the best amenities of Coliving 1907 – the rooftop.
Rooftop
One of the strongest selling points of Coliving 1907 is its rooftop. This huge, multifunctional area truly elevates the experience and is definitely the most beloved feature of most colivers.
The rooftop compliments Gran Canaria’s late spring-early summer temperatures throughout the year and serves as the perfect spot for all sorts of activities – day or night.
The space is big enough to be divided into different sections. The main part of the rooftop, and where the most activity happens, is the gazebo. The gazebo is the key solution that makes the rooftop useful and accessible at all times.
Even though many colivings in Spain have similar flat rooftops because that’s a typical feature of houses and buildings in Spain, with nothing providing shade, they make it hard to be used during the day. The sun in Spain can be very strong so without any shade, it’s practically impossible to stay on the rooftop for a long time and especially impossible to work from it.
Coliving 1907 found the perfect solution for this and elevated its rooftop to a maximum. The gazebo gives shade during the day and can also double as protection from the rain. So, with mild temperatures throughout the day, colivers prefer to spend their time outside, eating, working, or just chilling out.
The gazebo floor is covered in faux grass carpet, making it soft and cozy to walk on even barefoot.
Main Coworking Area
Besides this, there are two tables – one regular long table with 8 seats and one high table with 4 seats. There are also two egg chairs that you can move around, as well as extra chairs and two deck loungers that you can take out when you need them.
Other than the thoughtfully designed space, another thing that makes the rooftop the main coworking area is that it is packed with outlets and good wifi.
All these characteristics make this area the one that the colivers use the most, and the main gathering area in general. All events, activities, family dinners, and so on that happened in Coliving 1907, happen on this rooftop. There are about 20 spots for people to fill up the space but still be comfortable, which is a bigger capacity than the coliving itself, so on regular days, it’s a very spacious and comfy zone to have your breakfast, work, or share a conversation.
Other areas
Other than the gazebo, the rooftop has a back area (invisible from the gazebo) with a clothesline where you can leave your clothes to hang out and dry in the indirect sun and fresh air.
There is also a laundry room with a washing machine, detergent, softener, and iron with an ironing board, that is currently free for use on the roof. This room also doubles as a communal toilet.
Lastly, the central part of the rooftop is the one that stays in the sun so you can take out the deck chairs and sunbathe. It also has a nice platform in the middle that can be used as a sitting area or a central area for events during the night. Although, the events mostly happen under the gazebo, but we’ll get to that later. 🙂
The Community
Coliving 1907’s community is structured in a specific way that differs a bit from a typical coliving community.
The Core Community (Current colivers)
First of all, with 8 rooms, Coliving 1907 is a small-sized coliving, so the coliving community is also smaller and with dynamics that feel more like a family.
Las Palmas is a lively city with loads of things to do so most of the colivers live lives at their own pace, pursuing activities and hobbies they like. This means that, unlike some other, more remote communities, you will not see people here constantly doing everything together.
When there are shared interests, people will connect over them, but there is not that kind of pressure to engage in things you’re not particularly interested in only because it’s a pre-organized community activity.
The dynamics in the house are tranquil, respectful, and friendly, and the activities done together often happen organically and spontaneously. Going out with a few of your fellow colivers to a party feels like you’ve got family with you. You will see these people at home, you can always count on them to support you and be there if you need them. It’s not necessarily about spending the most time together, but always being there for each other.
The host
The host and owner of the coliving, Raquel, is also very well integrated into the community without putting the feeling of overlooking or micromanaging the community.
What makes this community even more family-like and the house feel like home is the fact that a lot of people are staying for at least a few months. People don’t come here to have an intense experience and go back home to their lives, they move their lives here and build the community around themselves.
Ex-colivers
All these facts are actually the reason why Coliving 1907 has another layer when it comes to its community that we don’t often see in other colivings. This layer consists of ex-colivers who stayed at the coliving, loved it, had to move out for one reason or another, but decided to stay closely connected to the place and the people, making a part of the extended community.
One of these folks we met was Carlos, who stayed at the coliving for 10 months, and after he moved out, continued being part of the community, coming to events, joining group activities, and so on.
Another example can be Daniel, a coliver that lived in the house when we moved in and moved out a few days into our stay. However, he was still so much integrated into the community, that it took me a whole week to realize that he had moved out.
Digital nomad community of Las Palmas
Lastly, besides these two layers of the community, there is another one, and that’s access and connection to the bigger network of digital nomads in Las Palmas.
Unlike most colivings, Coliving 1907 often opens its doors to the folks outside and helps its colivers become a part of the digital nomad community on the island by staying on top of the happenings in the city, giving you access to this big community on Slack, and organizing open events for everybody to join.
Now, let’s talk about how this coliving organizes its events.
Events and activities
Coliving 1907 organizes its events on a monthly basis, offering 4-5 events per month, most usually once per week.
Even though some colivings organize events more frequently, for Coliving 1907, this is the perfect amount of activities, and here’s why.
First of all, as we mentioned, most people stay here for a long time. When you’re coming on a 3-week long workation, having daily activities makes sense. However, when you’re living somewhere for a few months, you don’t have the energy and the capacity to engage in activities every day.
Once a week is more than enough to gather in a bigger group of colivers and do something interesting and fun and use the rest of the days in the week for yourself and your interests, occasionally and spontaneously socializing.
Secondly, in Coliving 1907, people are much more likely to spontaneously organize what was happening between themselves so they didn’t need an entertainer. Some colivings that organize daily activities, organize beach trips or go to a restaurant together. In Coliving 1907, those are not considered pre-organized activities as the colivers organize them between themselves.
The activities and events that Coliving 1907 organizes are more events than activities, so it makes much more sense to have them once a week, and leave space for more casual activities during the week.
Third, as we mentioned, Coliving 1907 is located in the center of Las Palmas – a big city full of life and daily events for digital nomads. By giving its colivers access to this bigger community in the city, they are exposed to daily events around the city and can choose where and when they will go and what they’ll do. There are unlimited possibilities in the city so making events more frequent in the colivings would mean making the colivers choose if they will stay inside or go explore other interests.
Fourth, as we mentioned, Coliving 1907 opens its events to people outside of the coliving as well. By posting in the digital nomad slack group and advertising on social media, at each event at least a few people from the outside join. It’s a great way to broaden the community, but also to offer valuable events to others as well.
For example, we organized our SEO seminar there, so, by opening the event to everybody, people outside the coliving who were interested in the subject had the opportunity to come and participate which resulted in some new connections. In a way, this is also how Coliving 1907 gives back to the bigger community of Las Palmas.
During one month, it’s usually a schedule of mixed free and paid activities. Some interesting events that you could find in Coliving 1907 are:
- International potluck dinner
- Raw tapas workshop
- Spanish workshop
- Coworking day
For us, participating in these kinds of events and hosting one of them in this structure was something new and very interesting and we find it to be another selling point of this coliving.
Managing a coliving this way is not very common and can be challenging. It’s much easier to have a community manager that will entertain guests daily in order to get good reviews and a positive experience. Coliving 1907 took that risk and exceeded it. Raquel did an amazing job using the opportunities of the city to engage the coliving’s community, but also, providing a balance between intense digital nomad experiences and tranquil home life.
With this approach, she managed to create a valuable family-like community that stays alive beyond the booking dates.
We appreciate your support!
Thank you for reading our content and following our journey! We are working towards becoming full-time content creators and being able to share stories with you even more frequently. If you’d like to support us to be one step closer to that goal, you can do it through Ko-Fi! 👇🏽
Secure yourself the best coliving experience
- italki – Why not learn some Spanish before your trip and make your coliving even better? italki is the perfect platform for that, where more than 3500 native speakers are waiting to help you with your Spanish.
