Gensler Designs Spacestor’s First East Coast Showroom in New York
Google search “open office plan” and a slew of headlines will pop up, all hungry to discredit the cubicle-free layout that has become the workplace norm. While it’s true that open spaces can encourage much-needed collaboration, they also cause employees to feel distracted or self-conscious. Thus the rise of companies like Spacestor, an office furnishings brand offering customizable space dividers, breakout booths, and more, which opened its first New York showroom today at 460 Park Avenue.
The British company already had brick-and-mortar spaces in London and Los Angeles, but decided to expand when it recognized a growing demand for its products on the east coast, where even the most buttoned-up firms are seeking to imitate the comfortable, mood-based offices popularized by Silicon Valley. To ensure its showroom would do the same, Spacestor tapped the expertise of frequent collaborator: Gensler.
Drawing on a well of research, Gensler devised an environment that resembles today’s most on-trend offices, blending a clean, corporate environment with clusters of hospitality-inspired soft seating and abundant plant life. The design choices embody Spacestor’s philosophy that a company’s focus on wellness and personal experience are as important—or more—to finding and keeping great talent as, for example, competitive salaries.
Gensler also made generous use of Spacestor’s Palisades Grid, a modular, customizable zone divider whose thin wood or metal boxes can be fitted with acoustic or privacy panels, both creating a sense of intimacy while permitting the passage of light and the illusion of open space. The firm then fitted the grid with accessories like a hanging whiteboard, mossy panels, and ceramics, ultimately delivering that much-desired balance between function and comfort.
Read more: Interior Design’s Workplace Roundtable Tackles the Big Questions
