IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 37
AOL’s fluid headquarters design allows employees to work throughout the space, with whiteboard walls capturing inspirational moments.
Photography: Jasper sanidad // The rebus Project
with shelves of poetry, like a beacon guiding them to the literature. Clear glazed interior walls visually link the public spaces, establishing an inviting communal place.
I
n the office arena, designing spaces to foster community and collaboration has been a mantra for a while, but their exigency seems more legitimate and urgent than ever. “With shrinking workplaces and more mobile workers, there’s an increasing need for designs that help people connect and have face-to-face collaboration,” says Felice L. silverman, IIDA, president of silverman Trykowski Associates. Ironically, technologically versed companies seem quite cognizant of this. microsoft recently converted an office building expressly to provide a communal place for its dispersed—albeit digitally linked—redmond, Washington, campus of approximately 35,000 employees. san Francisco-based studio o+A, which counts Facebook and yelp among its clients, transformed the interiors of the campus’s building 4 from traditional single-person offices into a drop-in meeting place-cum-workshop. The goal is to instill grassroots innovation by enabling coworkers with complementary interests and skills to share ideas and potentially work together.
building 4 offers a place and equipment for after-hours project tinkering, rooms for small groups to collaborate on long-term projects, a conference area dubbed “The garage”—in reference to how legendary technology pioneers got their start and to the literal garage doors that roll up to create a larger space—and a cafeteria that does double-duty as a town-hall meeting room. microsoft’s in-house design lead John snavely reports that building 4 has become hugely popular: “We have squatters from all over the campus.” It may sound reminiscent of the late ‘90s’ rage for “innovation labs,” but microsoft’s version eschews any high-minded “blue-sky” agenda for a distinctly roll-upyour-sleeves space. This valuation of physical place for interaction isn’t merely a regressive or nostalgic trend. nor is it a matter of either/or, with analog or digital space trumping the other. rather, these boundaries are becoming increasingly blurred. “Today, if you perceive a sharp distinction between real and virtual space, you are definitely an old consumer,” says Lance boge, an independent new york consultant specializing in what he calls “user-experience retail design.” He adds: “Talk to your kids; most likely they experience both as one fluid space.”
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011
From IIDA
Contents
Q+A
Open Source
Power Tools
CEU Course
The Inside Picture
Social Network
Retaking Place
MythBusters
Design Decoded
Resources
Viewpoints
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Cover2
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - From IIDA
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 2
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Contents
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 4
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 5
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 6
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Q+A
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Open Source
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 9
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 10
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 11
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 12
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 13
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 14
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 15
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Power Tools
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 17
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 18
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 19
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 20
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 21
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - CEU Course
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 23
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - The Inside Picture
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 25
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 26
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 27
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 28
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 29
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Social Network
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 31
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 32
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 33
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Retaking Place
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 35
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 36
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 37
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 38
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 39
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 40
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 41
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 42
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - MythBusters
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 44
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 45
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 46
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 47
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Design Decoded
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 49
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 50
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 51
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 52
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 53
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Resources
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - 55
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Viewpoints
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Cover3
IIDA Perspective - Fall/Winter 2011 - Cover4
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nielsen/perspective_2019fallwinter
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https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nielsen/perspective_2013fallwinter
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https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nielsen/perspective_2012fallwinter
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https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nielsen/perspective_2011fallwinter
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nielsen/perspective_2011springsummer
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