Asking to visit a university, and be given workspace for a week We have a few questions on offering to give a talk at a university.
And the general response is that is pretty acceptable.
It is basically asking to be invited as a speaker.

What I am wondering about is:

I am asking to be invited to speak and to be given a working space.

Details:

My university has a spare office or two in every department for "visiting academics". Is this typical of universities?
I believe they are intended for professors on sabbatical. But perhaps not exclusively so, last year an engineer with a well-known company's research group invited himself to use one such space in our university.
We also have a few spare spaces in the lab, I've never seen our space used by a visiting student, but friends in other labs tell me they fairly regularly have visiting student's in their labs.

I am going to a conference about a month before my PhD thesis is due.
It is in a city where I have a few contacts.
I've heard about some of the work their groups are doing, and I'd like to be able to meet with them.
I'ld also like to have a place to sit and work on my thesis when I am not.
I thought I might talk to my contacts and see if I could arrange to be invited to give a talk about my thesis work, and also be given some space to work.
(Whether a desk in a lab, or in an office, is of little consequence.)
I thought perhaps a week before the conference would give me plenty of time to meet with people and have deep discussions etc.

Asking for an invitation is of-course a favour, but I'm not sure how big a favor I'd be asking.


Is asking to be invited to visit a lab for a week a big favor?
Is asking for space to work on top of that a greater favor? (or is that implied?)
I disagree with the existing answers. I don't see this as a "big ask" at all, as long as your expectations are reasonable. You should not expect to get a nice individual office, but if I know you at all I would definitely be able to find you a space somewhere in my or my division's labs. My students have also done similar visits in the past, sometimes in labs that we did not have extensive connections to, so I guess other people also don't see this as a huge deal.

Of course you should have some idea what you and the host will get out of the visit - people may not be thrilled to host you if this is really just a cover-up for a private visit. Conversely, for a week-long visit, you should also not expect to be "entertained" for the entire week. People will not be able to cancel everything for an entire week.