Workplaces going public

Workplaces going public

Feb 22, 2014  | Architecture 

Workplaces going public
(Photo by: Peter Bennetts, Earl Carter, Hassel)

Modern workplaces are changing, becoming increasingly more like public places.

That was the theme of a London forum on workplace design where HASSELL designer Felicity Roocke was one of the featured presenters.

Speaking at the event hosted by On Office magazine, she said different design typologies are merging, reflecting changes in the way people want to work and their employers' business or operating models.

For example, some business workplaces now look more like learning spaces at universities or co-working spaces with employees choosing different work settings for different tasks. Individual offices and even personal desks are disappearing.

Felicity identified eight key themes within modern workplace design:

  • Workspaces are becoming more permeable, accessible and open to outsiders. This can be seen in many HASSELL designed projects, including ANZ Centre in Melbourne, the global headquarters for a major Australian bank. The building is designed around a multi-storey atrium that links different floors both visually and physically. It has fostered greater collaboration across the bank's different business units.
  • The workplace has to be somewhere people like working, becoming an important factor in why many people choose one employer over another. The offices of advertising agency George Patterson Y&R are described by many employees as the best place they have ever worked.
  • Activity is more intense and more diverse – workers in creative and knowledge based companies need a range of different work settings with both quiet areas for individual working and bigger, flexible collaborative areas.
  • Spaces are often self organising and self managing with employees able to reconfigure and move furniture and even walls. An example of this is Hub Sydney. It is a shared workplace catering for a dynamic, mobile, networked and independent knowledge-based workforce. Hub Sydney provides the introduction, interaction, learning and event experiences that add a meaningful layer of social and intellectual capital to the idea of a shared workspace.
  • Workplaces are more focused on creating community and social capital than just real estate. One example of a workplace that is also a community is dtac House in Bangkok, headquarters for one of Thailand's leading telcos. The dtac corporate philosophy of "play and learn" is reflected in the design of the workplace, challenging conventional notions of arrival, meeting, concentration and relaxation spaces.
  • Workplaces are destinations for events and engagement with clients, partners and collaborators. The HASSELL Sydney studio is designed around a large event and exhibition space. Work areas overlook the space which features bleacher-style seating.
  • Workplaces are seeking to involve more diverse types of people in a creative community. CEOs rub shoulders with freelance workers, creative media workers mix with finance and legal teams. The current work that HASSELL is undertaking advising the Battersea Powerstation redevelopment in London is focused on harnessing and expressing the vibrancy of its diverse creative community of tenants and visitors.
  • _Workplaces are spilling out into the public realm, with people working outdoors and in public space. HASSELL landscape architects are increasingly involved in designing outdoor and public spaces that support work activities, including outdoor work settings at Medibank's new headquarters in Melbourne (under construction) and concepts developed for Lend Lease's International Quarter development in London where the public realm is considered as a working extension of the office.

Felicity and the HASSELL team are supporting clients wishing to explore new opportunities for workplace design.

"Workplace design can unlock significant opportunities for organisations , whether they are businesses, public sector agencies or community groups," she said, speaking after the London forum. "At HASSELL we are pleased to be part of the debate about workplaces 'going public', and to be part of the vibrant design discourse in London."

Other presenters at the forum were:
Kevin Haley, Director, Abberant Architecture
Tobias Goevert, Principal Regeneration Officer, Greater London Authority
Oliver Marlow, Director, Tilt Studio
Jeremy Myerson, Helen Hamlyn Professor of Design, Royal College of Art
Luke Pearson, Co-founder, Pearson Lloyd, furniture designers

Via Hassel
Image,video ©: Peter Bennetts, Earl Carter, Hassel