Commercial Architecture May 2019 - 12

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FEATURE

| offices

Stanley Black & Decker engaged Dyer
Brown to design a new 5,100-sq.-ft.
innovation center located in the Boston
Seaport District's Innovation & Design
Building. The building's industrial feel,
including its exposed concrete floors,
ceiling, and brick walls, create a neutral and lightly finished backdrop for
the R&D collaboration that takes place.
Photo: Courtesy Dyer Brown

choices. The determination of whether spaces and workstations are

stance meetings and the exchange of ideas. Other techniques for

unassigned or mixed with assigned and single function should

workplaces include creating spatial juxtapositions and multiple

reflect the culture of the company or work group."

circulation pathways."

"Huddle rooms, quiet rooms, room schedulers for larger confer-

"We have seen amenity and community spaces increase, but one

ence rooms, and teleconferencing all foster the employee's ability to

of the greatest changes we will see is the desire for increased access to

choose where and how to work. Wireless infrastructure is critical for

nature (not just views of nature, interior plants, or green walls) for

supporting those choices for all this to happen. It all comes down to

building tenants. This may mean an increase in exterior workspaces

flexibility, supporting the staff's ability to select the area where they

like terraces, courtyards, atriums, and roofs," commented Perkins +

feel most productive for the specific type of task or work being pro-

Will's Kendra Ordia.

duced," Brotman said.

Her colleague Sara Barnes added that "since technology allows
employees to work anywhere for both focus and collaborative tasks,

MORE THAN OPEN PLAN

companies should ask themselves, 'what makes it worth coming to

Beyond the open-plan question, the office as we know it is changing

the office?' The answer to that question will give some clues as to

fundamentally. "Leading companies at the front end of the curve

where the future of the office is headed."

know that their employees are more productive when they have

"A recent Harvard study pointed out the issues of privacy and

options that suit their individual work styles," said Dyer Brown's

disruption, but this is only really a concerning issue when the cor-

Dunn. "These days our designs, which typically include some

rect support spaces aren't included in the program, and they almost

amount of open-plan office area, all incorporate appealing ame-

never are," cautioned Amy Jarvis of Spacesmith. "Desk space and

nities, a mix of work-area types, a range of seat and work-surface

headcounts are not the way to measure the square footage required

heights, and layouts and programming that encourage activity and

for a workplace project these days. Also, there's no such thing as one-

promote well being."

size-fits-all when it comes to finding the 'Goldilocks ratio,' the just-

The office is becoming a more active and less sedentary experi-

right proportions of support space to open space to amenity space."

ence, adapting and changing to meet work needs, according to

She continued, "There needs to be an investment made, before a

Andrew Franz. "Using stairs and mezzanines is just one approach,

lease is signed, to gather quantitative data that will help the archi-

encouraging users to move throughout the day, generating happen-

tects and designers tailor a design solution that best fits not only

continued on p. 14
12

MAY 2019

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Commercial Architecture May 2019

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