The open office has taken over modern business. While controversial, these large, open spaces—punctuated by conference rooms and phone booths—are the design of the day, and their proponents claim they increase collaboration. But open offices are also a communal petri dish. In the age of COVID-19, they’re the antithesis of social distancing.
Open offices will need to change for us to go back to work, but how drastically? We talked to Todd Heiser, a co-managing director at the world’s largest architecture firm Gensler, and Primo Orpilla, cofounder at the interior design company Studio O+A, which has designed open office headquarters for companies such as McDonald’s. Both have already been working with companies to adjust floor plans and practices in anticipation of bringing employees back to work. Here are the trends they see coming.
OPEN OFFICES WILL GET A LOT MORE OPEN AGAIN
One truth about the open office is that it has gotten a bit less open over time, simply because we’ve started packing a whole lot more people in. That’s a problem when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is suggesting at least 6 feet of space between people.
According to Orpilla, the prototypical open office should be designed to allow people to meander through the space and find their own nook or cranny to settle down in, without bumping elbows with a coworker.
“Anytime you look at a well-designed open plan, there’s only about 30% of people sitting at the desk. The rest are using other parts of the office space, thereby exercising social distancing on demand in their own way,” says Orpilla. “That being said, the target has been painted. Over the last five years, there’s been a push for the open plan model to densify. That’s where you’re seeing the problems. Some places were designed without the additional open areas, meeting spaces, or the right ratio of meeting spaces to headcount. They were not well thought-out.”
Already, we’ve seen companies in China mitigate their density by moving employees to staggered-shift work. Meanwhile, Facebook has announced that people will return to the office in waves. Other companies will likely take the same approach.
“In the beginning, maybe 20% of people will go back to work,” says Heiser. “Perhaps late summer next year we could see those densities grow.” Gensler has also been developing a tool for clients, which takes existing floor plans, and algorithmically suggests safer seating layouts. That might sound a bit over the top, using AI just to spread people a minimum distance apart, but several of their clients are working with over a million feet of office space. Some automation will be necessary.
For a larger version click on the image [Image: Gensler]
THE NEW WELCOME SPACE—A MUD ROOM WITH THERMOMETERS
If you’ve visited an open office in the past few years, you’ve probably been greeted by someone sitting at a desk. They point you to the coffee—either K-cups or brewed thermoses—and you help yourself before poking around a basket of fruit, then take a seat.
This is to make visitors feel comfortable without a lot of staff oversight. But comfort going forward will be about perceived safety, which is why self-serve coffee may not come back as designers reimagine office entries to deal with visitors and staff who need to decontaminate before entering a shared space.
“We’ve been thinking, what’s the new paradigm? Maybe it’s a mud room,” says Heiser. “You come in, change your shoes, wash your hands. Will sinks become primary in entries instead of self-service coffee?”
Many offices have such spaces, full of lockers, bike storage, and even showers. But these have been facing side doors and rear entrances. Now, these spaces might face everyone who visits an office. They might even be a place to run health screenings for anyone who comes into the building. “If we let someone in the building, [they might] infect people,” says Orpilla. “So we have to have better checkpoints to screen employees and visitors. We’re going to have to take your temperature [at the door].”
THE RISE OF THE CLEAR CUBICLE . . . AN ILLUSION OF SAFETY
Here’s a twist: Plexiglass is sold out from many suppliers. Why is that? Because architects and interior designers are securing the transparent material to build clear barriers between people.
“I know there’s a big run on it,” says Orpilla of Plexiglass. “Essentially, we’re creating gigantic sneeze guards. When you think of it, it’s like a sneeze guard at a salad bar. There are better materials that are more antimicrobial . . . but everyone goes to the clear plastic because the perception is, I have this barrier around me.”