One Workplace
Santa Clara, California, USA
Design Blitz, USA
One Workplace had already shifted the industry paradigm of sales and
showrooms away from a transactional experience to one of collaboration
and partnership. This leadership position makes One Workplace a
formidable client partner, and the next iteration of their corporate
headquarters needed to embody this innovation and progression. No longer
a static showroom, the working showroom needed to demonstrate what is
possible when great minds come together within the context of a
multi-disciplinary design lab.
Design Blitz was a natural design partner for One Workplace. As a young
firm who is redefining the architectural service model through their use
of client-friendly technology and open platform, they had already
established a track record for creating innovative workplaces for
several of Silicon Valley’s most successful technology companies
including Skype, Comcast and Square. Working in partnership with One
Workplace, Design Blitz realized the transformation in built form,
creating a working showroom representative of One Workplace’s evolution.
A collaborative process, the project brought together Design Blitz’s
expertise in workplace architecture and One Workplace’s special
knowledge of furniture to create a layered environment.
The project consists of 35,000 square feet of office/showroom/workspace
with an adjacent 180,000 square foot warehouse (warehouse improvements
were completed separately). In addition to the warehouse, the site also
included an existing 10,000 square foot stand-alone, mid-century office
building layered with many years of dated tenant improvements. The
project successfully connected this building and 25,000 square feet of
warehouse into the re-imagined workplace. Design Blitz’s design for the
new facade and landscape improvements expand One Workplace’s space into a
multi-functional indoor-outdoor environment.
In addition to redefining the showroom experience, the project is also
about adaptive reuse and urban regeneration. The site is located
adjacent to the San Jose Airport, arterial roads and a freight train
station in an industrial part of Santa Clara. The concept of transit
innovation with the omnipresent planes, trains and automobiles provided
significant inspiration for the design team. The city identified the
specific intersection where the site is located as a gateway to the
city. As such, this project not only had to serve the needs of One
Workplace, but also plays a key role in regeneration efforts of the
city. The warehouse and office buildings were both in disrepair. After
exploratory demolition, Design Blitz determined that the small office
building had great bones that could be salvaged and celebrated in the
new project. Given the raw nature of the existing warehouse and office
building and the exploratory nature of the Design Lab work typology, it
was determined that the design vernacular should avoid the pristine and
celebrate the industrial history of the site.
One Workplace is a family-owned and family-run company with three
generations having worked in the company. The family has a strong
Italian heritage and it was very important to celebrate the familial and
communal quality of the project. During initial conversations, concepts
of the kitchen as the family hub and the dining table as key elements
kept emerging. As such, Design Blitz used the kitchen as an opportunity
to bring all users together and as the programmatic connection between
the two buildings. Quite literally, the office meets in the middle.
Upon entering the building you are immediately presented with the
work-cafe. It is an area to meet and eat. Leading with this hospitality
function ensures that customers and users encounter a warm and welcoming
space. It was also during these initial conversations that Design Blitz
began mapping both the client and user experiences through the space.
The mapped experiences demonstrated that both customers and users would
be sent out into the space to experiences a series of carefully planned
touch points and then brought back to their starting point – much like
the path taken by a boomerang. The boomerang further manifested itself
in the creation of the two-story stacked ‘boomerang’ in the center of
the open office space. The elevated conference room and observation
platform allows members of the One Workplace team to quickly survey the
floor and show customers how a variety of systems solutions can intermix
to create a unified, flexible and layered approach to workplace layout.
One Workplace occupied their previous office for over a decade and
the new headquarters needed to last at least that long. Design Blitz
planned for longevity and flexibility by providing a raised floor system
in the open office for easy future furniture reconfiguration as well as
limiting color and pattern to elements that are easily interchanged as
trends change. In learning more about how One Workplace engages with
their clients Design Blitz determined that environmental context is key
to effective sales. Customers will purchase an entire space, an
environment rather than a single piece.
It was crucial that the architecture supported the furniture and not
the other way around. Individual spaces were designed holistically to
encourage an emotional connection by the customer. In addition to being
an innovative design, the project demonstrates strong metrics for the
economics of efficiency. One Workplace moved from a 45,000 square foot
space into the new 35,000 square foot space while increasing staff from
101 to 165. The increased efficiency was achieved by reduction in
workstation foot print and a move by the majority of the sales team to a
mobile work flow where workers do not have a dedicated workstation.
Mobile workers store their belongings at a centralized location and work
either at a shared workstation or in the soft seating of the work cafe
or alternate work areas. One Workplace is walking the walk when it comes
to modern work typologies."
- Design Blitz
