A Diverse Ecosystem
of Impact-Driven Changemakers
… Each contributing unique strengths
to our collective resilience.
Creative Space is not a monoculture but a vibrant ecosystem of diverse solopreneurs, each contributing unique strengths to our collective resilience.
Like a healthy forest that thrives on biodiversity, our community draws power from the varied perspectives, skills, and approaches of our members.
We are changemakers, visionaries, thought leaders, creators, futurists, and solution-focused professionals who share a common purpose: creating meaningful impact for a livable future.
a commitment to both external impact and inner growth
Our members come from all cultures, gender-associations, and ethnic backgrounds, united by their commitment to supporting one or more of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Inner Development Goals (IDGs).
This commitment to both external impact and inner growth forms the rich soil from which our community grows.
Just as in nature where diversity creates stability and adaptability, our differences strengthen our collective capacity to respond creatively to the complex challenges of our time.
The Roots of Our Community
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mpact-Driven Solopreneurs
Impact-Driven Solopreneurs working alone or in small start-up groups, each nurturing seeds of change in their unique field. Like pioneer species that prepare the ground for future growth, these visionaries are often the first to venture into new territories of innovation and impact.
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Certified Coaches
Certified Coaches (primarily ICF or EMCC) who, like the mycelial networks in a forest floor, create connections and facilitate the flow of resources, insights, and support throughout our community. They help members navigate challenges, clarify visions, and transform obstacles into opportunities for growth.
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Professional Creatives
Professional Creatives from all fields who, like pollinators in a thriving ecosystem, cross-fertilize ideas and bring beauty, clarity, and emotional resonance to our collective work. Their creative talents amplify our messages and translate complex concepts into forms that touch hearts as well as minds.
Our Shared Values
Like the fundamental processes that sustain all living systems, certain core values flow through everything we do:
Authentic Diversity - We recognize that monocultures are vulnerable to
disease and collapse. Our strength comes from genuine diversity—not just in demographics but in thinking styles, life experiences, cultural perspectives, and approaches to change.
We actively cultivate an environment where differences are not merely tolerated but valued as essential to our collective intelligence.
Regenerative Collaboration - We believe in creating relationships and systems that generate more life, energy, and possibility rather than depleting resources. Just as healthy ecosystems build soil and increase biodiversity over time, our collaborations aim to leave everyone and everything involved more alive and resourced than before.
Inner Development for Outer Impact
Inner Development for Outer Impact - We understand that the quality of our external work reflects the quality of our inner lives. Like trees that must develop strong roots before reaching skyward, we invest in our personal growth and well-being as the foundation for sustainable impact. The Inner Development Goals provide a framework for cultivating the awareness, compassion, and wisdom needed to address our world's complex challenges.
Reciprocity and Mutual Support - In natural systems, relationships of give and take create conditions where all can thrive. We reject the scarcity mindset that leads to unhealthy competition and instead foster a culture of generosity, skill-sharing, and mutual empowerment. When one of us rises, we all rise.
We recognize that personal, community, and planetary well-being are inseparable
Reciprocity and Mutual Support - In natural systems, relationships of give and take create conditions where all can thrive. We reject the scarcity mindset that leads to unhealthy competition and instead foster a culture of generosity, skill-sharing, and mutual empowerment. When one of us rises, we all rise.
Whole-System Health - We recognize that personal, community, and planetary well-being are inseparable. Like organs in a body, we function best when the whole system is in balance. We support each member's individual journey while keeping sight of our collective impact on the larger living systems of which we are a part.
“How else can I support your journey as a solopreneur?
As a coach, I'm happy to be your thinking partner, helping you clarify your direction, leverage your strengths, and create strategies to act.
I help solopreneurs undergoing transition, improving performance, achieving work-life balance
Mariann Nagatsu — Core Team & PRO Member, Coach, and
Solopreneur at Creative Space
I am a certified organisational coach and learning designer with over 20 years of experience in both the public and private sectors. I help solopreneurs undergoing transition, improving performance, achieving work-life balance, developing leadership skills, dealing with impostor syndrome, and enhancing personal growth. As you coach, I'll help you clarify your aims, uncover blind spots, harness strengths, create strategies and act. More about my approach and work with other client groups on my website :). Happy to work with you!
As a solopreneur, I thrive on the energy and inspiration that comes from co-creation and collaboration. So it’s probably not a coincidence that I have joined Creative Space Core Team already since the very beginning. For me, ideas start flowing when I have a great conversation partner. Having conversations with people in similar shoes, yet with very different hats, have helped me to build confidence as a solopreneur and discover new opportunities beyond my initial scope. This has been crucial in both my personal and professional growth.
One of my strengths is breaking down complex tasks into manageable,
actionable steps and then starting to walk. As tennis champion Arthur Ashe said, 'Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.' A great example is when I collaborated with brand design advisor Anders Tallvik as a Skills Sharing project to develop my own brand. Zero budget, great learning, inspiring outcome, ongoing partnership. In the end, you don't have to be an expert in all areas. However, having a trusted network of people you can turn to for expertise is invaluable as a solopreneur. Since then, I've become a strong advocate for Skills Sharing and happy to help other members find ways to develop their businesses through this approach. I'm excited to see what new opportunities will emerge from Skills Sharing initiatives and co-create these initiatives further.
I'm a creative strategist and brand architect
with over 20 years in UK broadcasting and media.
Charlie Palmer — Core Team & PRO Member, Creative & Solopreneur at Creative Space
I thrive on creating bold, innovative brand identities that blend deep audience insights with creative flair and am driven to develop brands with purpose. I also excel at unifying complex elements into engaging narratives across multiple platforms.
As a solopreneur, one of my biggest challenges is the isolation that comes with working alone.
Without people to bounce ideas around with, I often get stuck in cycles of procrastination and perfectionism, endlessly redrafting my work because I’m trying to anticipate every possible flaw. This has made it hard to put anything out into the world confidently. I’m actively working on letting go of that perfectionism, but it’s definitely a process.
Since joining Creative Space, I’ve found a lot of value in collaborating on strategy and creative ideas. I’ve particularly enjoyed advocating for the use of language models to help capture and refine thinking, which has become an important part of my creative process. It’s been rewarding to help shape the direction of Creative Space, even if we're still in the early stages.
Looking forward, I’m really excited about creating a dedicated idea-bouncing space within Creative Space, where small groups of three to four people can come together to solve problems collaboratively. I’m passionate about helping others tackle their challenges, and I believe that working on other people’s problems can often spark unexpected solutions to your own. This kind of group dynamic would not only give me the feedback and interaction I need as a solopreneur but also create a space where others can benefit from the same collaborative energy.
I’m a strong advocate for integrating technology, like language models, into creative processes, and I enjoy participating in discussions that lead to clear, actionable ideas. I look forward to co-creating solutions with others and helping to build a dynamic space where we all benefit from each other's ideas and support.
I build schools, playgrounds and learning spaces for children in the rural areas of Tanzania
Ahmed Shams — Solopreneur & PRO Member at Creative Space
Hello, I am an initiator, a pioneer, a solopreneur and an engineer. I build schools, playgrounds and learning spaces for children in the rural area of Tanzania. As a nature loving person, I plant trees and create fruit gardens in our school premises. I work hand to hand with the local communities while using local materials to realize our projects.
Working with projects in such remote areas which are far from small towns is never easy. There are many challenges facing me and my projects. One of challenges is that many people would like to see me doing what I do in the urban centers and not in villages. Secondly, it is hard to get people to visit the projects physically and this means there is less support for the project. Nevertheless, incomes derived from the villages are always small, so making our projects struggling for sustainability.
HELP NEEDED If I could ask for help, then I would need good fundraisers for my projects. I always believe there is someone out there who would like to work with us and is enthusiastic with what we do. Our doors are open and we are ready to work with that person.
I am dedicated to exploring the future's challenges and possibilities.
Veslemøy Klavenes-Berge — Podcaster, certified Mentor, and Solopreneur — Core Team & PRO Member at Creative Space
Substack | Podcast | LinkedIn | Website
I'm a podcaster, mentor, and solopreneur with a background in petroleum geophysics, now dedicated to exploring the future's challenges and possibilities.
Through my podcast Stories for the Future, I inspire optimism and action, focusing on the energy transition and helping others align their careers with purpose, impact, and excitement for what lies ahead
In Creative Space, I've found the co-working environment I was missing as a home-based solopreneur: friendships, advice exchange, and people who celebrate your successes and support you through struggles. After years of working alone with its ups and downs, I cherish the autonomy and creative freedom of being my own boss. However, I've learned to recognize when I need help and the benefits of seeking it.
As an accredited business mentor, I focus on the personal and values-driven aspects of starting and running your own business. With four years of experience hosting and producing my own podcast, I'm passionate about all things audio and am happy to advise anyone interested in this path.
This season, my podcast concentrates on building bridges and bursting bubbles in the energy transition. I'm working to create more platforms for difficult yet crucial conversations to take place.
I am a conceptual brand identity advisor
Anders Tallvik — Creative, Core Team & PRO Member, Creative Space
I am a conceptual brand identity advisor who helps you figure out who your brand really is at its core and how to express it. By coaching you through the brand discovery process, I help you develop you a clear brand identity, tone of voice, visual direction, and guidelines for implementing it all.
I came across Creative Space at the exact right moment in my career as a self-employed creative.
I was struggling with direction for my business, so the idea of meeting other people on the solopreneur journey to explore solutions together was very attractive. In the process of co-creating Creative Space, Mariann Nagatsu and I decided to experiment with skillsharing as a way to develop our respective businesses, and it was a success! I was left with a clear sense of direction for my business, and she got a visual identity out of it. It made me realize that my approach is similar to that of a coach, which was an eye-opener and helped me decide that conversations are really at the core of my design process.
I'd love to coach more impact-minded people through the brand discovery process to create great brand identities that go deeper and express their core mission and vision boldly! That's something I bring to Creative Space. I'd be interested in having additional members coach my business process and approach; for example, I'd love to develop methods for staying the course and inspiring myself during those weeks when I'm stuck behind a computer screen with very little "coworker contact." More than that, I want to FIND OUT what I could do with my business through the rich and beautiful conversations within this space.
“I recognised the immense reciprocal value that creatives, coaches, and solopreneurs could unlock
by converging their unique talents & perspectives. “
I support solopreneurs committed to creating a better future.
Ruth Nelson-Andorf — Initiator of Creative Space, Creative, Coach, and Solopreneur
My journey as a solopreneur led me to co-found Creative Space, a community dedicated to elevating solo business owners. Our mission is clear: to champion those who channel their entrepreneurial spirit into the well-being of humanity and the health of our planet, all through the lens of sustainable and ethical business practices.
The making of Creative Space is deeply rooted in a range of personal aspirations, challenges, and transformative experiences. My professional path, which included working for an international environmental NGO and engagement in animal rights advocacy, left me acutely aware of the heavy feelings of overwhelm and anxiety that often accompany such profound work. I realised that solopreneurs, navigating these critical global issues — like myself, frequently find themselves in a state of heightened isolation, yearning for the immediate and empathetic support of peers who truly grasp the magnitude of their mission. As a freelance designer, I also lived the solitude of long nights spent in front of a computer screen. Now, in my capacity as a certified coach, I am often approached with inquiries about building a coaching practice and the viability of sustaining a livelihood solely through coaching.
These collective experiences illuminated a profound interconnectedness across diverse professions. I recognised the immense reciprocal value that creatives, coaches, and solopreneurs could unlock by converging their unique talents and perspectives. This realisation, in essence, became the fertile ground from which Creative Space blossomed—a dynamic community where self-employed professionals, united by an unwavering commitment to supporting people and the planet, converge to foster genuine collaboration. I initiated this vision with a crucial test case, extending an invitation to kindred spirits who now form the bedrock of our core team. Together, we have organically evolved into co-creators, each member enriching the collective through their distinct skills and invaluable expertise.
Today, Creative Space stands as a rapidly expanding international movement of passionate, purpose-driven individuals. Every member of our community is singularly focused on either directly nurturing the well-being of people and the planet, or empowering other impact-driven solopreneurs to amplify their positive reach.
I guide creatives and coaches on their self-employment journey
Jessica Lohmann — Creative Space Core Team & PRO Member Creative Space | Founder of Ethical Brand Marketing
I joined Creative Space to connect with other creatives and coaches, so I can support them in their marketing journey and also improve how I facilitate my marketing programs.
I guide creatives and coaches on their self-employment journey by helping them craft ethical, results-driven marketing strategies that align with their values, attract mission-aligned clients, and build thriving businesses with purpose.
