Archinect - News

AMO design for the Prada 2024 FW Men's Show stages nature against an invasive interior environment

2024-01-21T08:00:00-05:00

AMO’s latest collaboration with the fashion industry went on display recently as part of the 2024 FW Prada Men's Show, held on January 14th at the Fondazione Prada for Milan Fashion Week.

For the presentation, AMO and partner in charge Rem Koolhaas created a scenographic imitation of an outmoded office environment set against an outer landscape that appears to audience members from beneath a transparent platform stage as though an “analogue projection among the many digital images that saturate one’s life today.”

This theatrical blending of nature and its opposite keys to the brand’s stated desire to produce clothes that reflect the spaces and seasons surrounding them. It, of course, also pays homage to design trends apparent in the latest examples of corporate architecture.

“In the space of the Deposito an improbable encounter takes place: chaos and order, reality and fiction, predictability and spontaneity – seemingly opposite elements – engage in a game of collaboration, a syne...

3XN GXN and British Land share new transformation project of London's Euston Tower

2023-07-13T13:57:00-04:00

3XN GXN, alongside property development company British Land, has announced that they are leading the redevelopment of London’s Euston Tower. Built in 1970, the commercial high-rise was viewed as a cutting-edge office space. However, changing tenancy needs have seen a gradual reduction in its inhabitants, leading to the building’s vacancy in 2021.

The aim for the renewed Euston Tower is to transform it into a pioneering, welcoming, net-zero workspace in the heart of London’s Knowledge Quarter. The project falls in line with the sustainability goals and expertise of British Land, the Greater London Authority and Borough of Camden, and 3XN GXN. As noted in a release, the joint vision for the project sets out to lead the way in low-carbon retrofit and construction techniques, as well as using inclusive design to support the workspaces and local community.

Image courtesy of 3XN GXN.

As stated by 3XN Senior Partner Audun Opdal, “We are proud to work on this highly progressive project and...

HWKN's upcoming commercial tower will bring a 'grade A, sustainability-certified workspace' to London's Canada Water Dockside

2022-12-02T14:24:00-05:00

UK real estate developer Art-Invest has announced Matthias Hollwich and the team at HWKN Architecture will be the designers for a new commercial tower at the Canada Water Dockside in London. The tower will be one of three new commercial buildings built on the 4.5-acre development, which will be master-planned by BIG.

The New York-based studio will make its UK debut by reportedly designing a 1.5 million square feet of "grade A, sustainably-certified" office workspace for up to 10,000 workers. The project includes 100,000 square feet of "affordable offices for small businesses, alongside community spaces and other amenities" located on the building's ground floor.

"Having worked with Matthias [Hollwich] and his team previously we knew his visionary and innovate approach would be well suited to Canada Water Dockside, and we’re delighted to be bringing his architecture to the UK for the first time," Luka Vukotic, the Development Director for Art-Invest, said in a statement.

Image court...

Zoom Town to Boom Town: North American business districts are going to evolve instead of dying off completely

2022-08-29T17:30:00-04:00

Even if the office were to go the way of the horse-drawn carriage, the neighborhoods we refer to today as downtowns would endure. Downtowns and the cities they anchor are the most adaptive and resilient of human creations The rise of remote work today won’t kill off our downtowns, but they will be forced to change once again. And with smart strategies and perseverance on the part of city leaders, real estate developers and the civic community, they can become even better than they were.

Writer Richard Florida is back with a new look at the “basic reason” behind his predicted rebound of central business districts, which he claims is an inevitability based on the historic evolution of such areas and recent building trends to convert hotels and office buildings into residential housing. Florida had previously explained that the pandemic has merely accelerated existing shifts towards remade “central connectivity districts,” and now points to a new study by the University of Toronto’s School of Cities as evidence that their rebound is (pardon me) a slam dunk.

He then predicts that suburbs will bear the brunt of the urban office exodus — in particular for knowledge workers — which in turn will remedy the “separation of life and work that was the product of the Industrial Revolution.” Florida also alluded to an interesting Gensler survey of city dwellers, which ranked office space near the bottom in terms of importance.

See inside Nike's new Serena Williams-themed office building

2022-07-20T19:18:00-04:00

Portland-based Skylab Architecture has shared new photos of its recently-completed signature office building dedicated to an American tennis legend (and design aficionado) and located at Nike’s World Headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon.

The more-than-one-million-square-foot Serena Williams Building, anchored around a 12-story tower, was designed to help the sportswear giant maximize creative workflow and efficiency inside a new 2,750-person office whose focus is similar to recent workplace designs for other large corporations that are equally bent on re-instilling collaboration in a post-pandemic world.

Photo: Jeremy Bittermann

According to the architects, the theme of the “warrior muse,” a nod to the building’s namesake, served as material inspiration throughout the LEED Platinum-certified facility’s art-filled collection of workplaces, conference rooms, dining areas, laboratory spaces, and other coworking amenities.

Photo: Jeremy Bit...

KPF breaks ground on a new headquarters for T. Rowe Price in Baltimore

2022-03-31T19:36:00-04:00

An exciting birthday gift is underway in the Charm City as Kohn Pedersen Fox has finally broken ground on a new headquarters for T. Rowe Price in the company’s hometown of Baltimore 85 years after its founding.

The project was announced in December 2020 and centers around a new 550,000-square-foot two-winged building with an all-glass central atrium sited along a prime piece of waterfront real estate fronting the pivotal gateway of Baltimore’s Inner Harbor area.

Image © Atchain, courtesy Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates

KPF Design Principal Jeffrey Kenoff said the project will create a “hyper-porosity, both visual and physical, from the Central Plaza down to the harbor. The façade specifically reduces the scale of the massing through a cadence of grey double-height bays that echo the city’s historical DNA and industrial heritage.”

Plans are for construction to be completed in 2024. The building will aim for ambitious Fitwel Three-Star and LEED Platinum certifications in its interiors. T...

Make Architects transforms former chocolate factory into boutique office building in Sydney

2021-05-19T18:14:00-04:00

Make Architects has converted a former chocolate factory in Sydney, Australia into a boutique office building. Situated in the city’s Haymarket district, the building was originally built in the early 1900s. The project is the latest in a series of new developments in the area with dining, commercial, and retail uses moving in.

Preserving the structure’s original character was the core focus of the project. The design has retained as much of the pre-existing components of the 3-story building as possible, including the steel beams, timber flooring, exposed brickwork, and original hoists. New materials such as copper, concrete, and terrazzo, all sourced from within Australia, were chosen to contrast with the old.

Make Architects crafted a new main entrance by painting over the original brick facade and adding a new copper and steel portal door. The former roller shutter entrance has been replaced with a custom double-height reeded glass and steel door that slides up, opening the lo...

Is it time to pivot away from open office design?

2021-04-30T14:23:00-04:00

Office design has changed over the years, but perhaps one of the most infamous design trends has been the open office layout. Pitched to foster collaboration and optimize space while bringing a new modern edge to the workplace environment, corporate offices across the globe were eager to adopt this design to their office. Since its emergence, the open office concept was synonymous with start-up headquarters, Silicon Valley tech offices, new corporate offices looking to adopt a trendy new work environment for their teams, and more. However, after years of championing open office design, the team at Clive Wilkinson Architects explains why "the open office is dead."

Amber Wernick, an associate at the firm, explained to Fast Company in mid-April that the number of possibilities for appropriate office designs in 2021 increased because of the pandemic. "Once they [the public] were forced to work from home and be away from the office, I think it opened a lot of peoples' minds to what the o...

Amazon reverses plan to move into under-construction Seattle tower

2019-03-04T19:06:00-05:00

Amazon is abandoning a prominent downtown Seattle office project 10 months after it threatened to do so if the city imposed a new business tax. [...] Amazon confirmed Wednesday it will not occupy the 722,000 square feet it had leased in the Rainier Square tower under construction at Fifth Avenue and Union Street. The lease was one of the biggest in Seattle history — enough space to hold at least 3,500 employees and perhaps up to 5,000.

Sounds familiar, said Long Island City.

Aerial view of construction progressin February 2019. Image: Rainier Square.

Designed by NBBJ, the 58-story mixed-use Rainier Square tower is currently under construction right next to Minoru Yamasaki’s famous Rainier Tower in downtown Seattle and will win the title of second-tallest tower in the Pacific Northwest once finished next year.

Rendering of the 850-foot (260-meter) tall tower at night. Image: Rainier Square.

According to WeWork "Buildings equal Data"

2019-03-02T13:08:00-05:00

There are T-shirts floating around WeWork’s New York City headquarters that say “Buildings equal data.” The nano manifesto hints at a conviction that architecture should be shaped by a methodical study of how people utilize spaces instead of unique aesthetic signatures. More than that, correlating digital information with physical structures is good business—it has quickly become a core strategy for the eight-year-old, $47 billion company racing to expand its footprint globally.

Architects today are very familiar with data and its influence over design, construction, and feasibility. However, what else can data teach us? When you're a massive billion dollar company like WeWork, opportunities for turning data into teachable tools coincides well with the company's progressive ethos.

No 1 Poultry in London - WeWork interior; Image © WeWork

Say what you will about the company, regardless of your views their intentions of transforming the tools and perspectives of real estate, architecture, and design is reflective of the decisions they've made thus far. For WeWork, data isn't just a tool but an asset to the company's overall growth and success. "It’s hard to overstate how essential data is to WeWork’s operations. Specifically, architectural data. Nearly four years ago, the company underscored this dependency when it acquired Case, a BIM consultancy whose expertise WeWork relied on even in its early years (it was founded in 2010). With David Fano, Case’s co-foun...

WeWork is making moves, should other co-working spaces be worried?

2019-01-11T15:12:00-05:00

The We Company will be comprised of three main business units: WeWork, its main office business; WeLive, a fledgling residential unit; and WeGrow, a still-evolving business that currently includes an elementary school and a coding academy. Although the company could not provide specifics, it says plans are in the works to build out its residential and education units this year. Also

Early this week, WeWork's CEO Adam Neumann revealed significant changes to the infamous co-working space that took the globe by storm when it opened their first workspace in 2010. Quickly becoming one of "the fastest-growing lessee of new spaces in America," by 2014, the company seemed unstoppable. Since then, numerous other co-working/office space companies appeared on the scene. However, many alternative companies could not compete with WeWork's services as well as their overall design aesthetic.

Draw made by WeWork CEO Adam Neumann and co-founder Miguel McKelvey during a brainstorm session in 2009 Image © WeWork

Singapore Beach Centre - WeWork's 200th Location Image © WeWork

Paddington Location in London Image © WeWork

2019 will be a big year for the company turning 9. Neumann will announce at the WeWork Global Summit that the company will no longer be called WeWork, but The We Company. In a recent interview, Neumann expressed the company's transition from renting desks and office ...

WeWork may become NYC's largest office space renter with 1 World Trade Center deal

2018-09-04T13:05:00-04:00

The company is negotiating a lease in 1 World Trade Center to take over about 200,000 square feet in the building, a source close to the deal told CNNMoney. WeWork recently became the second-largest renter of office space in the borough, according to a Cushman & Wakefield report earlier this month. WeWork trails just about 74,000 square feet behind JPMorgan's New York tenancy. If the deal goes through, WeWork would surpass the bank.

According to Crain's New York Business, WeWork is close to finalizing the lease with 1 World Trade Center. The co-working space company has grown tremendously in the past 8 years it has been operating with offices now in over 20 countries around the world.

For more backstory on WeWork's success, check out our conversation with co-founder Miguel McKelvey, recorded live from New York, during this year's AIA National Convention.

Could "landscrapers" like Google's new London HQ represent a shift in workplace design?

2017-12-05T14:00:00-05:00

Last month, London mayor Sadiq Khan, joined by a trio of Google executives, broke ground on the site of Google’s new campus in the city’s King’s Cross district. [...] The property has been dubbed a “landscraper,” a building as long and as horizontal as skyscrapers are tall and vertical, and it could represent a shift in the very shape of the places where people work. Google’s London flagship will be 1,082 feet long, which is 66 feet longer than The Shard, London’s tallest building, is high.

Quartz' article features input from American futurist, Amy Webb, who predicts a bright future for landscrapers — not only in London.

Image courtesy of Google.

More about the new Heatherwick Studio + BIG-designed Google London HQ here.

Panopticon is the new open-plan

2017-09-29T14:38:00-04:00

Good news! In response to your “concerns” about our current open-plan creative campus, we are pleased to announce our new building: a towering panopticon à la Jeremy Bentham’s eighteenth-century vision of utilitarian corporate efficiency! In our new office, all team members will work in isolated, transparent rooms called “Cells” on the periphery of a circular tower called “Synergon.” At the center of Synergon, management will reside in “Nest,” a glowing, elevated sphere of omniscience.

Alex Baia imagines dystopian panopticon office space for app creators.

OMA's plans for Axel Springer building officially released

2016-10-06T13:20:00-04:00

OMA's Axel Springer building, which received the official launch from its namesake company today, visually confronts the disparate nature of modern office work. The 30-foot tall atrium with 3D facade elements creates a stage for unscripted interaction, while the more discreet sections of the building provide focused, quiet working space for 3,500 employees. The building will also feature a publicly-accessible park on its top.

As Rem Koolhaas noted, “Over the years, Berlin has been a profound source of inspiration, and with Axel Springer we are thrilled to continue our long engagement with this city.
We are lucky to have a client who views architecture as an instrument of change, and with this building, we hope to address a central dilemma of the contemporary office: as computer-based work has become largely intangible and silent, how can people effectively
communicate in a workspace which fosters both concentration and vigorous interaction?”

For more on the Axel Springer building:

OMA wi...

"[Architects] are not the creators of the city, but the midwives" says Bjarke Ingels

2015-07-23T13:51:00-04:00

In a fifty-one minute conversation with New York Times critic Michael Kimmelman, Bjarke Ingels does little to dispel his reputation as a media-friendly starchitect who dances his way around thorny design issues by reminding everyone of the rose. When Kimmelman brings up the wind issues that an 80th story outdoor space (such as the ones proposed for Two World Trade Center) is likely to encounter, Ingels relates an anecdote about how in Denmark the only car to have is a convertible, because even if the pleasant days are rare, they must be savored fully.

However, it is Ingels' redefinition of the architect's role, especially in the context of the discussion about how to shape the future cultural vibe of Manhattan, that makes Kimmelman shift in his seat:

Ingels: [Architects] are not the creators of the city, but the midwives.

Kimmelman: You make the architect sound a little more passive or receptive than maybe I'm comfortable with. Do you think the architect is just receiving other peopl...

domæn ltd.'s NAN hints at Orange County's potential for more innovative design

2014-01-16T19:11:00-05:00

domæn ltd.'s remodel project "NAN" reminds us that an ordinary industrial warehouse is always full of refreshing design possibilities. Located on 1907 Nancita Circle in Placentia, CA, NAN shows off domæn's signature sharp lines and black-and-white color schemes that give the structure an edge over the area's numerous warehouses and the generally lackluster landscape of Orange County.

On the other hand, in addition to being a recent example of adaptive reuse, remodeling projects like NAN could be another sign of potential growth for the city of Placentia and its neighboring cities, which have been aiming towards economic revival in the past decade.

Below are more details to NAN that the architects shared with us:

"The NAN project seizes the opportunity to play on typical office configurations, and offers a lofty, industrial appearance. The exterior treatment follows the interior logic, taking advantage of the precast concrete facade and playing with contrasting textural qualitie...

NS Stations by NL Architects

2013-07-02T18:06:00-04:00

NL Architects recently completed the project NS Station, a major office interior revamp over 9 stories right on top of Central Station in Utrecht, the Netherlands. The project resulted from a 2011 competition win where NL Architects made the Thick Walls™ system the conceptual core: big shelves absorb the clutter that normally spreads trough the office - wardrobes, bookshelves, flip boards, archive, bulletin boards. And sometimes even the stairs.

Morphosis' new Culver City offices

2012-10-16T20:48:00-04:00

The fairly rectangular structure, located just a few feet from the new light rail Expo Line’s elevated tracks in Culver City, gets most of its energy from photovoltaics—a 2,800 sq ft array sitting on top of a shaded parking canopy outside. But what makes it all work are the energy savings: It significantly reduces loads through several low-tech, high-tech, and even revolutionary techniques, most of which were developed with engineers at Buro Happold, whose LA offices are just down the street.

Robert Peck, ousted head of Public Buildings Commission at the General Services Administration, is hired by Gensler

2012-08-28T17:02:00-04:00

What constitutes a modern professional workplace is changing rapidly, and Gensler, the San Francisco design and architecture firm, is betting those changes will factor more heavily not only into clients’ interior design decisions, but every single real estate decision they make. That bet led Gensler to hire a well-known name locally in both design and real estate circles: Robert A. Peck.

From Cubicles, Cry for Quiet Pierces Office Buzz

2012-05-20T11:18:00-04:00

The original rationale for the open-plan office, aside from saving space and money, was to foster communication among workers, the better to coax them to collaborate and innovate. But it turned out that too much communication sometimes had the opposite effect: a loss of privacy, plus the urgent desire to throttle one’s neighbor.

Open Doors form Open Minds?

2012-03-19T14:07:00-04:00

The architects often walk clients through it to show how an open environment works. There’s not a private office or cubicle anywhere, and there’s constant low-level hubbub: people in motion, and gathering into small groups. The tour makes some clients nervous; they wonder how their own workers would concentrate in such an environment.

Lawrence Cheek examines new trends in office designs which focus on providing employees room to roam and thus to think. Specifically, he looks at three examples the Seattle offices of Russell Investment, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation headquarters as well the offices of the architectural firm be hind the first two examples, NBBJ which occupies two 38,000-square-foot floors of a midrise office building it designed in 2006.

My Cubicle In The Starchitect's Building

2011-05-10T20:01:57-04:00

Nearly half a century after Habitat 67, I worked five days a week in a cubicle in Safdie's latest high-profile creation, the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C. And as I stared at a computer screen in my small slice of Safdie-dom, I wondered: What good has visionary architecture ever done for working plebes?

Leah Caldwell discusses the perspective of an office worker in a building designed by a "starchitect".