Fluid workspaces: is the era of prescriptive office design over?

The era of prescriptive design is over. Fluidity in all shapes and forms seems increasingly the norm across disciplines, touching upon most areas of life. From fashion to travel, and from how we live to where we play, flexibility, adaptability and nuance are increasingly taking over briefs and project descriptions. The societal shake-up that followed the pandemic has had a major effect on this process. In recent years we have seen houses that turn into offices, workspaces that feel like homes, industrial spaces that transform into event or entertainment venues and manufacturing facilities that open up to the public like never before… The list goes on.

Fluid workspaces herald the future of office design

While this spatial mashup might have a seed in fear of commitment or decision fatigue springing from a market offering an ever-wider choice, it is perhaps also rooted in a pushback against the authoritative voice of starchitects and styles of the past century. It also chimes with our efforts to make every inch of space and design gesture work harder than ever before, a drive for efficiency mixed with an expression of frugality in the face of our era’s sustainability (and financial) challenges. It is certainly the sign of a public that knows more and better what it wants and how to get it in every market; a client that is not easily satisfied and demands to be surprised - but not dictated to.

Such is the case in the thinking behind Derwent London’s newest workspace innovation - the launch of a series of club lounges to anchor its 5.5m sq ft portfolio in the capital. While the debate around flexible working and offices that allude to domestic environments rages on, Derwent is disrupting the market by bringing a hospitality element to the mix. Why not create a workplace setting that makes you feel like a member of a private club? ‘Quality workspace now comes from the service, the amenity and the community as well as from the physical aesthetic,’ says the company’s executive director Emily Prideaux.

Meanwhile, Danish fashion brand Rains is bringing its - typically back-of-house - warehouse and distribution facilities to the fore in its new headquarters in Aarhus, taking pride of place alongside all the other departments that make up a successful business. Creative and logistical centres flow into each other, enriching the experience of both sides for the company’s employees.

This shape-shifting is practical, but fun too. This spring, Italian design giant Molteni&C unveils Palazzo Molteni, its new flagship in Milan that is at once a showroom, event space, brand home and workspace. More of a lifestyle experience than a store, the expansive, seven-storey interior looks and feels like a luxurious urban villa with all the fun and dazzle you would expect. ‘We wanted to create a space that feels like you are stepping inside the home of an art collector,’ the brand’s creative director, Belgian architect Vincent Van Duysen explains. If options are what we’re after, it looks like we’ve got them.