BLURRING BOUNDARIES IN WORKPLACE DESIGN
June marks the beginning of London’s Festival of Architecture. A month-long celebration and programme of events, encouraging conversation about London’s architectural landscape.
The theme of this year’s festival is boundaries. Boundaries can make us feel comfortable or they can create insular communities and division. The festival asks the question, should we be blurring these boundaries through architectural endeavour?
How does this relate to our buildings at International Quarter London (IQL)? Designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, one of the main aims of the design is to break down boundaries in the workplace. Open plan working in place of team-based offices creates collaboration. But a variety of clearly defined spaces and break-out zones give employees from organisations including the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Transport for London and Unicef UK more flexibility within their working day.
Ivan Harbour talked to us about the design of 12 Endeavour Square in particular, and how connectivity – horizontally across floorplates and vertically across floors – is key to creating better workplaces.
He also discussed the importance of how the buildings relate to their external environment, and to each other in our Architect Series on YouTube, which you can see and listen to here.
You can learn more about the London Festival of Architecture on their website.