• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, August 1, 2013

YouTube plans to open YouTube Space NY, giving creators a place to make content. The space in the Chelsea Marketplace district, scheduled to open by October 2014, will span about 20,000 to 25,000 square feet. 

The business model aims to shake up content creation on mobile, traditional PCs and Internet television.

It joins a list of other locations in Tokyo, London, and Los Angeles, where content creators can use the facility for free.

The New York facility will provide content creators with a place to make original videos for their channels, collaborate with other creators, share experiences, and learn best practices for building YouTube channels, Kathleen Grace, manager of production and programming for the YouTube Space LA, told Online Media Daily. "We want to invest in partners who built channels on the platform," she said,

Grace helps run the partner program and facility with support from about 30 to 40 full-time employees. Satisfying eclectic styles has become the biggest challenge, along with creating the best experience for all partners, Grace admits. "It's part-hippy commune, incubator and studio," she said.

Grace said some Google Glass explorers are YouTube stars and have begun to film and produce content on devices.

In the more than 40,000-square-foot L.A. facility, which opened in late 2012, content creators will find professional edit bays and Apple Macs loaded with programs like Final Cut Pro X, sound booths enabling voiceovers, and mixing boards similar to the ones used for Saturday Night Live. 

Events and workshops occur weekly. YouTubers in New York can expect much of the same.

Aside from the seven sound stages in L.A., creators can use hallways, lobbies and any available open space in and around the building to produce content with equipment like screening rooms, 7.1 surround sound, and 4K high-definition projectors.

HLW designed the space in L.A., the former home of the Howard Hughes airport. The building designer will also work on YouTube NY Space. The systems integrator CBT built the technical infrastructure, complete with Google Fiber at 1 gigabit per second upload and download speeds, and the contractor HBC produced results in less time and under budget, although Grace declined to provide numbers.