[interview] the project story
Image Credit : Thierry Martineau
Project Overview
A dynamic, 3-storey, 19,000 sq ft suite of offices, created for fast-growing brand and packaging design agency BrandOpus.
The new workspace, located within the former Freemantle TV Studios at number one Stephen Street, London W1 was a pre-let by developers Derwent London.
Paul Taylor, Executive Creative Director and Partner at BrandOpus, said of the project: ‘We are delighted with our new studio and I am so pleased that it has turned out to be everything we imagined and more. Thank you for the time and effort that has gone into getting us in. This place is truly amazing. We are extremely proud of it and I am certain that it is going to have a significant impact of the future growth of BrandOpus.’
Project Commissioner
Project Creator
Team
Gurvinder Khurana - Director
Nigel Tresise - Director
Project Brief
Brand and packaging specialists BrandOpus had been experiencing a period of rapid growth and needed a much more ambitious space to expland into. The brief was to create a comfortable ‘home from home’ via open spaces with hints of a domestic vernacular and special-purpose smaller spaces including a video conferencing area, but, in particular, a suite of lower ground meeting and social spaces for both staff and clients, where the residential theme found full expression in rooms named The Study, Lounge, Snug, Drawing Room, Dining Room, Kitchen, Library and Conservatory.
The overall open-plan sections of the offices needed to be non-traditional, with a collaborative atmosphere and where creativity and the easy flow of people, information and communication could easily be promoted.
align got the best out of the creative partnership with BrandOpus by ensuring its creatives joined the design team for regular workshop sessions throughout, but especially at brief development stage, so that real ownership was shared between all and was properly rooted in the company’s brand values and culture.
Project Need
This project needed to reflect both changes in the world of workplace design via smarter working, but also very specifically the way this particular company wanted and needed to organise its space. Whilst open-plan, transparent working was to be the norm, the directors and partners needed a little more privacy for discreet conversation and concentration and their area therefore, whilst feeling open, has subtle barriers and screens.
There also needed to be break-out spaces, plus single-use spaces, such as the video-conferencing booth area. The lower ground area is much more about communication and relaxation, encouraging social interaction over food and drink and offering various levels of privacy for clients with hush-hush projects a long way off market.
The initial configuration of the existing ground floor studio spaces could also be seen as quite fragmented and align needed to work closely with the BrandOpus team looking at the optimal flow and journey for both staff and for visitors.
Design Challenge
The great challenge was to make the space really work for the BrandOpus team. The vision was for staff to work together primarily in the ground floor studio and mezzanine spaces in zoned, delineated but still fundamentally open-plan areas, whilst visitors would be guided directly from the entrance to a lower-ground floor reception area and a network of individual social and client-facing meeting spaces.
Major interior architectural changes included a re-located main entrance, created in order to lead visitors more naturally to the reception area and to follow the natural sweep of the road.
Another structural change was punching a huge circulation void just inside the new entrance to create a very clear flow down to the lower ground floor. The void would be visible from the 6m-high glazed exterior and would feature a new lift, along with a spectacular new curving stair, conceived by align and inspired by the Fibonacci sequence. This allowed for slow and comfortable access to the lower-ground area and also allowed for a real sense of grandeur and arrival, as well as ensuring that plenty of natural light could percolate through into this windowless storey.
Sustainability
The building originally had 2 floors of basement car park. Car parking spaces were actively reduced as part of developer Derwent London's Cat A works and consolidated to only one floor. Cycle use was encouraged with a new cycle centre with provision for over 120 cycle spaces and shower facilities. As part of align’s fit-out works, we provided supplementary shower facilities on the lower ground floor adjacent to the cycle spaces to further encourage cycle use.
The project has achieved a BREEAM rating of ‘Very Good’, reflecting Derwent London’s desire to improve the sustainability of its portfolio. The considered MEP design and high final airtightness has achieved an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of C - a significant improvement on the inefficient original building and approaching that of a newly built office. An innovative system for shower waste water heat recovery is also being trialled on the project, targeting a 40% reduction in the energy required for showering.
Interior Design - Corporate
This award celebrates innovative and creative building interiors, with consideration given to space creation and planning, furnishings, finishes, aesthetic presentation and functionality. Consideration also given to space allocation, traffic flow, building services, lighting, fixtures, flooring, colours, furnishings and surface finishes.
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