Here’s a home for the hackpacker in you.
This May, the Construkt Startup Hostel popped up in India’s Silicon Valley, Bengaluru. Not only does it offer a cost-effective boarding facility for start-ups but also as well as a collaborative space for the entrepreneurial community in the city to interact with each other.
“To forge connections and celebrate the spirit of entrepreneurship” is the core philosophy of Construkt, says co-founder and head of business development, Shashikiran Rao, who, along with Karan Bahadur, started the hostel based on Rao’s visit to Berlin last year. Finding himself alone in the city, Rao made friends through the entrepreneurial community there, and found that “there was a requirement of at least 18,000 rooms nights per year” according to a survey on founders of startups that he conducted.
Thus began the idea of a start-up hostel where founders of various start-ups could meet more like-minded people, just like the backpacker tribe. “Backpackers come together and travel together,” says Rao, “We took that inspiration and matched it with the hacker community and called ourselves the hackpackers.” Hence the hostel’s tagline, “Home for the hackpacker in you.”
The hostel is a three-storied building, located in Indiranagar and is painted in cheerful orange and white hues, “because these are the Construkt colours”, says Rao. With 3,500 square feet of space in total, the lounge, dining area, kitchen and bedrooms upstairs all reflect a rich creative environment for brilliant minds to flourish. Most of the furniture is from recycled or re-modelled materials. Their lounge sofa for instance, is made out of a bathtub, and their kitchen stools were formerly old electric wire spools.
Priced at INR 850 a bed per day, Construkt offers bunk beds in rooms that are shared between two to eight people. Facilities such as free Wi-Fi, a self-catering kitchen, a space for small events, a laundry area – and lots of coffee are available, of course.
You can book yourself a room on their site and stay updated by following them on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
