As we continue to work
with an ever growing range of clients we are excited that we are being asked to
design more creative and imaginative offices. Companies,
particularly in the creative or tech industries, are desiring offices that look
more like adult playgrounds than a place of work, in the hope that it will make
their employees more creative.
It's a trend that started in the US, with
basketball hoops and jelly bean machines cropping up in creative offices. Having
a fun environment, they believe, will help spark conversations and
collaboration, encourage people to be playful and, crucially, generate great
ideas. It will also impress clients and help with talent retention and recruitment.
Google recently released early design plans
for its new UK headquarters in King's Cross that included a climbing wall
between floors, a swimming pool and a running track on the roof. It withdrew
the plans shortly after, saying it wanted to challenge itself to be even more
ambitious.
With that in mind here are our top 10 ‘cool’
design ideas from the UK.
Woodland retreat (BBA AVIATION)
BBA Aviation’s head quarters situated on
Wigmore Street London provide
specialist on-airport support services to the owners and operators of business
and commercial aircraft. When Hi Design created the new offices the
goal was to create a woodland breakout oasis in the middle central London. With
the clever use of graphic wallpaper, wood finishes and glass paneling Suki
Shocker of Hi Design provided staff a place to relax with nature and feel
refreshed after a not so inner city lunch break.
A
slide (Ticketmaster)
Earlier this year, US firm Ticketmaster opened
the doors to its new overseas head office in London. The ticket sales company
designed the office to prioritise socialising. Its standout feature is a metal
slide that staff can take to reach the bar area, where table football, a
jukebox and pinball machines await.
Playfulness is a vital part of creativity,
says Matt Kingdon, co-founder of an innovation consultancy that styles itself
?What If! and author of The Science of Serendipity. But he adds "the way
to trigger this is not an indoor slide. It is much better to create a space or
opportunities that encourage colleagues and different teams to bump into each
other. This is more likely to trigger thinking that challenges the status
quo."
But Bridges says the impact of a playful
environment can be helpful: "If a space gives you permission to have fun
and enjoy yourself, that is more likely to make you creative than a stiff
formal situation."
Disco
tunnel (Karmarama)
Coming into work through a "disco
tunnel" might be calculated to dissipate Monday morning blues. Advertising
agency Karmarama also has a collection of strange objects inside its offices
including a huge red Buddha, a VW camper van and a life-sized plastic llama.
A recent study
at the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota suggests
that these wacky offices could help people be creative as researchers. It found
that people working in orderly environments were more likely to conform to expected
behaviours.
One of the report's authors, assistant
professor of marketing Joe Redden, says, "Our work supports the notion
that funky offices aid creativity. The key idea is that a non-conventional
office supports non-conventional thinking. One of the challenges in being
creative is to break out beyond the typical way of thinking... A less organised
office helps people do this."
There is a scientific excuse for a messy desk
after all.
Grass
floor not a glass ceiling (Innocent Drinks)
The entire office floor at Innocent is made of
fake grass, even under the desks. The main kitchen area is filled with natural
light, bunting and benches for people to sit together. There is also a cosy
reading corner with a selection of books.
Innocent's environment manager Charlie Heavey
says that while there are tea stations on every floor, "there is only one
kitchen area so everyone has the opportunity to mix with everyone else - we
were very particular about the layout of the building because we wanted to
encourage interaction".
Picnic
benches - Duke Studios
Like Innocent Drinks, Leeds-based Duke Studios
has an outdoors feel to its interior. The co-working space was founded by a
photographer and interior designer who disliked other office spaces offered in
the city. Inspired by Google and Pixar, they created their dream office last
year, which now houses 42 small creative businesses. The pair made the office
open-plan to ensure people spoke to each other, and have a strict application
process to maintain its open culture.
"The benefit of talking to other people
is that you are exposed to ideas you wouldn't otherwise have come across,"
says co-founder James Abbott-Donnelly. "Networking with other people
requires extra effort, and that doesn't come naturally to most people. We have
engineered a space where people will meet each other in an informal way without
the need for name badges and handshakes."
An
indoor sky (Virgin Money)
Virgin Money's Edinburgh operation centre has
an eye-catching sky painted on its ceiling. The new layout secured an award
from the British Council for Offices.
The theory is that staring up at the clouds is
likely to have a beneficial effect on creativity. Bridges says that to be
really creative, a person needs to use their unconscious mind to work on a
problem.
A
wooden treehouse (Mind Candy)
Mind Candy, the company behind children's game
Moshi Monsters, has an office that encourages employees to think like its
customers. It is based at the Silicon Roundabout at London's Old Street and has
a wooden treehouse and gingerbread house as meeting rooms, a colouring-in wall
and quiet areas that look like hobbit holes.
Thinking like a child can aid creativity
because it means people question the norm, says Now Go Create's founder Claire
Bridges, who advises companies like Pret A Manger on how to be more creative.
"Much of creativity is about risk-taking and pushing boundaries. A child
will always ask 'why' and this mindset can be helpful when coming up with
original ideas," she says.
A
padded cell (Wieden + Kennedy)
Ever felt so frustrated at work that you want
to scream? Employees at advertising agency Wieden + Kennedy have a green
leather padded cell at their disposal. MD Neil Christie says the cell was
installed after someone told his creative director Tony Davidson, "The way
you carry on, you should be in a padded cell." Workers there suggest that
as well as being an offbeat fixture, it also turned out to have great acoustics
for conference calls.
One
huge desk (Mother London)
There are no teacher's pets at advertising
agency Mother. Every member of the agency sits at the same huge concrete desk
that spreads throughout its space in Shoreditch's Tea Building.
This helps staff to talk to each other and
removes hierarchies.
Kingdon says that being exposed to unusual or
unanticipated thoughts can help increase creativity, particularly ideas that
might not initially sound particularly sensible. "Bumping into someone
that you haven't seen for a while is one of the best ways of colliding
different strands of thinking," he says.
Beach
huts (Man Bites Dog)
PR agency Man Bites Dog has been inspired by
its Brighton location. Its office has a full-length indoor pier, its meeting
rooms are beach huts and one of them is decorated to look like a forest.
Managing director Claire Mason says it would
be easy to dismiss the decor as a gimmick, but argues: "If we look at hard
performance measures such as staff retention, engagement, productivity, quality
of work and team satisfaction with their workplace, then it's a clear
winner."
