Futuristic Design Takes Center Stage In This Chrome Office

Lately, it feels like we cannot escape discussions about the future of work. Where will it take place? Who will do it? And what tools will we use? Many of these conversations position technology at the center, musing over the role of the metaverse and artificial intelligence, so it’s no surprise that workplaces are beginning to find design inspiration in this futuristic, digital world. Take the latest such project to come out of One House Design, a Shanghai firm helmed by founder and chief designer Lei Fang.

On the banks of Shanghai’s Huangpu River, overlooking the city’s Yuejie Expo Park, the new office of financial investment company Shanghai Transaction Succeed combines technological sleekness with artfully abstract interventions, yielding a space that feels plucked from the metaverse, or perhaps Star Wars, of which the client is enamored. “Technology, future, and diversity were the key words of our concept,” Fang begins. “Our goal was to construct a wonder-filled encounter between people and space, work and life.”

One House is well versed in creating marvel-inspiring environments. The multidisciplinary studio’s portfolio spans residential, restaurant, and retail projects in addition to offices—in fact, Fang’s own won an Interior Design Best of Year Award for its obsidian-drenched, gallerylike setting—all rather genre-bending. Here, the third project Fang has completed for this client (he’s also designed its office in Lingang, the area known as Shanghai’s Silicon Valley, along with the owner’s home), he has honed his approach for the brand, expressing the STS ethos and aesthetic through a minimalist color and materials palette and a restrained formal language.

The 21,500 square feet occupy the top floor of a four-story building, enjoying 360-degree views of the Shanghai cityscape and river. Throughout the workspace, which hosts 15 employees and a mix of private meeting rooms and offices alongside open-plan desks and leisure areas, including music and banquet rooms and a fitness area, Fang has zeroed in on the idea of an encounter between worlds. Throughout, a repeated language of curved walls, reflective surfaces, and monochromatic colors makes the office feel like a futuristic portal—a liminal space between the present and the unknown, between this world and a more streamlined one to come. “The organic forms and undulating silhouettes create a fluidity that mimics a wormhole,” he explains.

Upon entering, the reception area immediately transports visitors and staff to a gleaming, high-tech environment. A high-shine, stainless-steel desk emerges from a concave, dark-gray curved accent wall, with window openings set off by built-in interior walls that establish a visual divider between the office and the world beyond. “We wanted to break the form of the conventional workplace,” Fang notes.

While the floor plate is rectangular, and enclosed spaces retain their traditional rectilinear plans, at the heart is an exhibition showcase that indeed breaks the mold. Enclosed in two stacked, open-square frames within an oversize glass cylinder, the gallerylike volume houses rotating examples of the core products the company invests in, mostly raw materials for the renewable energy industry. “The idea was to present a realm within a realm,” Fang says.

The aesthetic qualities within this artful box spill out to inform the rest of the project. The curvature of the glass partitions is mimicked in the curving walls and dividers populating the office, and the blue of the screen-printed phrases wrapping the installation is repeated in select furnishings and statement walls throughout, the color extracted from the company logo.

The inspiration for the curves also came from the company’s branding, as the logo incorporates the shape of the letter D. Fang used variations of the letter to inform the partitions, window openings, and furniture selections. “D is also in line with Dao, which is consistent with STS’s brand values,” Fang says, referencing the East Asian philosophical tradition emphasizing that the natural order of the universe must be lived and experienced, rather than intellectualized.

Here, we uncover the core tension that distinguishes this workplace design: the collision between existing in a physical versus a digital, intellectually manufactured world. While the concept may conjure the look and feel of the metaverse, where shapes are abstracted and details blur, this seamlessness was created through a close attention to craft.

For example, take the primary material used to form the curvilinear aspects. Fang sourced a resin-based artificial stone that, when heated, can be curved and shaped, then polished to create a seamless connection between floor, wall, and ceiling. “It allowed us to achieve a ‘one-piece’ effect,” Fang explains—a sense of fluidity that could only be found through careful, handcrafted artistry.

Additionally, while much of the work of STS takes place digitally, the workplace dedicates ample space for activities focused on personal interaction, like the music room and the lounge area adjacent to the gallery. Taken together, the office reminds us that although our lives increasingly play out in a digital landscape, the pleasures of a well-crafted physical space are best enjoyed in person.

Step Into The Future At The Office Of Shanghai Transaction Succeed 

ONE HOUSE DESIGN: LI HUANG; WANG JIARUI; ZHAO BINJIE; WENDY LI; PASS PAN; CHEN YING. SHANGHAI KAIBO DECORATION ENGINEERING CO.: STAINLESS-STEEL WORK. YICHENG GLASS: GLASSWORK

FROM FRONT MAFI: WOOD FLOORING (OFFICE). MOOOI: WALLCOVERING (OFFICE, BANQUET ROOM). THROUGHOUT BENJAMIN MOORE & CO.: PAINT.