In one corner of the room sits a large pile of laundry waiting for a wash while in another corner there’s the home office and a big work project with a looming deadline. In yet another other room, a couch beckons with the temptation of a morning nap and a Netflix binge session. This is the common 24-hour friction between home and work life that has remote workers looking for options as temporary pandemic work conditions have now become permanent for many.

In Dorchester, hundreds of home and remote workers have turned to the Fields Corner Business Lab to stay close to home while getting a respite from the madness. The new demand has sparked the Lab to expand its footprint and, as a result, more than double its membership numbers this year.

Developed originally by Travis Lee eight years ago on the fourth floor of the Lenane Building in Fields Corner, the Lab first served gig workers, small businesses, and start-ups that needed a place to land for a few hours or a few days. Once Covid restrictions were lifted, Manager Sarah Riddle said they began to attract weary remote workers looking for refuge. She said they expanded to the second floor in March and opened a third-floor renovation in July. Since the pandemic began, they’ve gone from 80 members to more than 200.

“It has been a consistent trend the last year,” said Riddle. “People tell me they need to get out of their homes. A lot of people that are still working at home become isolated and they can come in here and avoid that, even if it’s just seeing another person across the room.

“Some find that coming outside from home makes them so much more productive with their time,” she added, noting that it allows them to restore the separation between home and work.

That is exactly the case for Danielle Oaks, who works remotely for a large company based in Idaho. While she and her family will not be moving to Idaho any time soon, she said the job opportunity would never have emerged without the trend of remote working. The downside was that her home office became stifling.

“I needed to get out,” she said from her dedicated desk in the Lab. “This place has been a godsend. I have a lovely home office, but there was a need to also get out of it.” She said it wasn’t just about balancing work, but also home duties. Laundry became a daytime task, and family time extended into the afternoon. Soon, she was working only at night.

“My business is in another place and I’m here at home. At least when I’m at the Lab, I know I’m at work.” She said she was able to negotiate a salary increase recently that is intended to pay for her Lab membership.

It has been the same for Dorchester resident Simeon Naranjit, who for 14 years has run Vulcan Consulting, a computer IT company for small and mid-sized businesses. Most of his work is at client sites, or from home. He worked more at home in the pandemic, then tried to go to Panera to escape the pitfalls of home. Last month, he chose the Lab. Since then, he said he has a new “vibe and flow” to his work and is glad to support a local business and not a workspace chain.

“I drop my kids off at school at 7:15 a.m. and in the past I’d come home and take a nap and then wake up and work,” he said. “In that routine, you’re groggy and there’s no momentum. Now I drop my kids off and go to the Business Lab and I’m wide awake and getting things done. It’s not happening in a hoodie.”

The Lab’s Riddle said the changes began when some business tenants moved out two years ago and that allowed them to remodel and open part of the second floor. Soon, another tenant consolidated operations downtown and vacated the rest of the second floor and the third floor. She said a prospective tenant was looking at the office space and was won over by the Business Lab concept instead.

“We had a business that came to look at the third floor and they saw the Business Lab operation and said that was what they wanted,” said Riddle. “So, we took that input and expanded the Lab to the third floor and many of the workers from that business are now members.”

Riddle and Office Manager Deatrice Moore said they have different levels of membership, from a regular office at $600 to $2,000 per month, to a dedicated desk at $325 per month, to flex space memberships at lower costs that allow people to use communal spaces and conference rooms.

Memberships come with amenities like a kitchen and the all-important copy machine – which the Lab maintains and operates so members don’t have to worry about time-consuming office equipment leases or contracts.

They also offer a small gathering space for 25 to 30 people available to members and also to the community. So far, Riddle said, many have used it, including companies doing trainings or holiday gatherings.

Beyond that, co-working spaces come with the opportunity to bounce ideas off members over a cup of coffee in the common areas.

“I had a great conversation the other day about cooperative and employee ownership of companies,” said Naranjit. “I was interested in that. It sparked a conversation with another member, and I had a good 30-minute conversation that was out of the blue but of interest.

“As it turned out, the person with the knowledge of that topic was right there and gave me a plethora of information.”

Added Riddle: “There’s also human interaction and being able to say ‘hello’ to someone,” she said. “In the changing work world that has become a huge benefit of the co-working community.”

Others like Naranjit and Kenisha Jean Simon said they have more family flexibility, and fewer work distractions. Naranjit said he is only minutes from home and his children’s school and can run home for a bit without having a huge time impact on his work.

Jean Simon works for the Imajine That after-school provider that runs programs in Dorchester and Mattapan, including at KIPP Boston in Mattapan, the Mildred Avenue School in Mattapan, and the Sarah Greenwood School in Dorchester. She opted for a desk at the Business Lab in May, and her company is already trying to secure a larger administrative office at the Lab.

She said that what she enjoys is the ability to have both working worlds. “I love it because I can still work from home and go into the office as well,” she said. “It’s definitely needed with having a two-year-old and a teenager. Having that space away from home has become very important… It’s a safe space to work because I can work without distractions.”

Riddle said they have only two offices left from their expansion but still have ample flex spaces available. However, increasing demand doesn’t necessarily mean they plan on more expansion. For the moment, they are looking to maintain and learn.

“When you grow really fast, you have to routinely re-evaluate how things go. We’ve had some great wins that work for people, but we’ve had things we’ve done where we needed to pivot as well,” she said.