Nyambura Gichohi on Nature, Wellness, and Intentional Growth, and Coworking in Africa

Most workspaces begin with a question about square footage. Ikigai began with a question about how people should feel.

Liz Elam reconnects with Nyambura Gichohi, CEO and Co-Founder of Ikigai, the Nairobi-based coworking brand known for its beautiful, nature-filled spaces and focus on wellness, on the latest GCUC Podcast. 

When Liz and Nyambura last spoke, Ikigai had just opened its fifth location, and Nyambura was preparing to go on maternity leave. A lot has changed since then. Ikigai is approaching its 10th anniversary, Nyambura is balancing business with life as a mother of two, and the company has spent the last 18 months doing something that isn’t always easy for a growing coworking business: slowing down.

Choosing to Slow Down

After opening its fifth location, Ikigai could have continued on the same path: find another location, open another space, keep growing. Instead, the team decided to consolidate.

“We decided to slow down, to stop, to consolidate to really get better,” Nyambura tells Liz.

For Ikigai, that meant spending time understanding what it was already doing well before deciding what came next. The team interviewed every member of its staff, spoke with coworking members, researched the global and African coworking markets, and spent an entire year developing its new 2030 strategy.

What emerged was a much clearer understanding of the company’s identity.

Ikigai isn’t simply a coworking company. It is a nature-based wellness organization.

And that distinction is becoming increasingly important to how the company thinks about its spaces, its members, and its future.

What Does Nature Have to Do With Coworking?

If you’ve seen an Ikigai space, the connection is obvious.

The company started in a converted house on a two-acre garden rather than in a traditional office. But for years, the Ikigai team heard members say some version of, “There’s just something about being here.”

They knew people loved working surrounded by greenery, and they started investigating to understand why. 

Nyambura became particularly interested in research on biophilic design, including Terrapin Bright Green’s 15 Patterns of Biophilic Design, and in the growing body of research on how exposure to nature affects human well-being.

She breaks the potential benefits into three areas: cognitive function, mental health, and physical health.

The research Ikigai found suggests that even relatively short periods of exposure to nature can have an impact. Mental restoration can begin quickly, regular time in nature can influence mood, and longer exposure can help reduce physiological signs of stress.

And then there’s the part that makes this especially interesting for coworking:

Members aren’t just visiting these spaces. They’re spending their workdays there.

Some Ikigai members spend eight hours a day surrounded by nature.

So what happens when the environment where you work is actively designed to help your brain recover, your mood improve, and your body relax?

That’s the question Ikigai wants to get better at answering.

From “It Feels Good” to Measuring the Impact

Nyambura sees an opportunity to delve deeper into nature-based wellness and potentially establish a more evidence-based approach to designing coworking environments.

And it raises a bigger question for the industry.

If we know that people spend a large portion of their lives at work, shouldn’t we be thinking more seriously about what those environments do to them?

Coworking has always been about more than a desk. For Ikigai, the physical environment itself is becoming part of the wellbeing proposition.

Why Mental Health Belongs in Coworking

The conversation naturally leads Liz and Nyambura into a broader discussion about wellness, and specifically mental health.

Liz shares her vision for GCUC Access, an initiative she wants the coworking industry to embrace: making free mental health services available to coworking members as part of the offering, rather than treating them as an optional add-on.

Nyambura is already heading there.

Ikigai provides free, unlimited mental health support to its employees, and she talks openly about how valuable that benefit has been.

The next question is whether that support can eventually extend to member organizations.

For both of them, the idea reflects a larger belief: coworking has the potential to help people live healthier, more connected lives.

Who Is Choosing Ikigai?

That philosophy seems to resonate particularly strongly with mission-driven organizations.

At Ikigai’s garden locations, approximately 70% of organizations are mission-driven. The garden spaces naturally attract organizations working in areas like climate, conservation, and carbon.

But Ikigai also works with philanthropic organizations, social enterprises, multinational companies, creative businesses, consultants, recruiters, and larger distributed teams.

There is a particularly interesting connection between Ikigai and NGOs.

Why Coworking Makes Sense for NGOs

NGOs often operate on grant funding, which can create unique challenges when it comes to real estate.

Grants may run for two or three years, while commercial leases can last much longer. Committing to a long-term lease becomes difficult when an organization’s future funding isn’t guaranteed.

Additionally, for donor-funded organizations, the priority is generally to put money toward their mission rather than spend significant resources building out an office.

Coworking and flexible workspace allow NGOs to access professional infrastructure without taking on the same level of long-term commitment or capital expenditure.

But Nyambura is careful not to position NGOs as Ikigai’s entire strategy.

The bigger strategic focus remains nature-based wellness.

The NGOs are simply one example of how the model can work particularly well for organizations whose values align with what Ikigai has created.

What Makes Coworking in Africa Different?

Nyambura is excited that GCUC Africa is bringing operators from across the continent into the same room this September in Cape Town.

While there are many similarities among coworking markets worldwide, coworking in Africa presents its own set of challenges and opportunities.

Operators may have to navigate power and transportation issues, political disruption, and other infrastructure challenges.

At the same time, African markets offer things that are difficult to replicate elsewhere.

Nairobi’s entrepreneurial ecosystem has earned it the nickname “Silicon Savannah.” Kenya’s climate also enables Ikigai to create garden-based coworking environments that simply wouldn’t work in many other parts of the world.

For Nyambura, the exciting part is bringing African operators together to talk about it all.

Why Africa Needs More Coworking Collaboration

Nyambura has attended GCUC events around the world and has noticed the camaraderie among operators. She wants to see more of that happen across Africa.

“There’s just so much value in sharing the challenges and the successes that we’re having with each other,” she says.

That’s one of the biggest opportunities for coworking in Africa right now.

The industry is still developing, and operators don’t have to figure everything out alone.

There is an opportunity to share knowledge, collaborate rather than compete, and build a stronger community across the continent.

And that’s exactly what Nyambura hopes GCUC Africa can help spark.

Getting the People and Systems Right Before Scaling

Ikigai may be practicing slow business, but Nyambura is very clear about one thing:

The ambition to scale is still there. The company simply wants to make sure it is ready.

As part of its strategy process, Ikigai identified two major areas that need to be right before the next phase of expansion: people and operational excellence.

The company now has a team of 72 people, along with a strong leadership team. Building skills, culture, ownership, and alignment across that team is a major priority.

The second piece is systems: reliable technology, repeatable processes, and operational consistency.

Because once those foundations are in place, expansion becomes much easier.

Instead of reinventing the business every time a new location opens, Ikigai can replicate what works.

What’s Next for Ikigai and Coworking in Africa?

As Ikigai approaches its 10th anniversary, the company is entering a new phase.

Become exceptionally good at something distinctive: creating nature-based environments that improve people’s experience of work and well-being.

And as Nyambura heads to Cape Town for GCUC Africa, she’s bringing that perspective into a much larger conversation about the future of coworking on the continent.

Want to hear the full conversation?

Listen to the latest episode of the GCUC Podcast with Nyambura Gichohi, CEO and Co-Founder of Ikigai, wherever you listen to podcasts.

And if you’re ready to continue the conversation in person, join Nyambura, Liz, and the global coworking community at GCUC Africa in Cape Town this September.

Come for the conversations. Stay for the connections. And be part of the conversation shaping the future of coworking in Africa.