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Campfire at Next

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Steelcase’s Turnstone had a booth at Next, an art show for emerging art. The booth was set up on the main drag and featured the new Campfire product line and some fantastic cocktails with names like “Ghost Story” and “Killer.”

While the Campfire product line is fantastic, and fit in well with the featured art, what made it more special was that Tim Stoepker and Kirt Martin were there to share about the design process in creating the products. Tim and Kirt were two of the designers who created Campfire and made it what it is today. There are a couple things that I learned as Tim captivated our group with design stories, challenges and victories.

Turnstone is committed to bringing amazing products to the consumer in a competitive price point.
Tim shared the challenge of the Big Lamp. This sleek designed piece had gone through several revisions before it was ready to be ordered and shipped. The light switch had been changed, materials selected and the huge lampshade had to be redesigned several times for it to be able to collapse and ship compactly and with ease.

It doesn’t just have to look good, it has to feel good.
Kirt and Tim explained the construction of the http://www.turnstonefurniture.com/products/campfire/biglounge.aspx and the rigorous process that happened just to choose the foam. It was hilarious to hear about how many people partook in the process and how the priorities were for it to be comfortable and a destination spot. The lounge is padded so that you can sit on the back as well as the seat, and both are super comfy!

Great ideas happen around impromptu meetings.
Campfires are known as a destination spot, a time of good memories and a place people connect. Turnstone really wanted to capture this culture and introduce it into the office environment. The Paper Table is just the thing to gather around and focus. This table is available with a pad of paper or glass for dry erase capabilities and lends itself to conversations that spontaneously happen.

Campfire is something more than just great furniture. It’s good design with a story, it’s art and it was a perfect fit at Next.

Flexibility

There was this fantastic video on You Tube that showed a fabulously flexible living space in Hong Kong. This space was designed by an architect who used his design sense to create the ultimate living space in a small room that can transform quickly to support whichever space you need.

While many of us won’t do this in our homes or offices, there are other ways that we can plan for flexibility and using real estate to its fullest potential.

Offices often have large conference rooms that are used only a portion of the day. By designing conference rooms to transform at a moments notice, these spaces can be used throughout the day. This can include a combination of lounge furniture as well as tables and chairs and allow the space to be broken into smaller work zones for guests and small collaborative groups.

Workstation quantities can be reduced for offices that house nomadic workers. If people are not in an office full-time, then it doesn’t make sense to dedicate a large workstation to them for normal working hours. Having hoteling stations and areas where employees can share workspace when needed keeps costs down.

Furniture that multitasks keeps the necessities to a minimum. A screen that can divide space as well as be a markerboard or tackboard serves several purposes, assists in getting work done and is flexible.

Verticle space should be used to maximize storage and highlight items that are important to the organization. Going up keeps the client from expanding out and keeps real estate needs lower.

There are always ways to increase flexibility within a space. It’s how it’s used and making sure that the layout allows for creativity and multiple uses throughout the day that counts.

Integrating Culture in a Space

With America being a melting pot of cultures, it can be difficult to see the individualism that makes our country so rich with diversity. We are constantly trying to honor all and not offend. This extends into interior design practices as well.

Whether coming from a beautiful background or just having an elevated interest in a particular culture, integrating pieces from these areas of the world will make a statement in your space. Celebrating these cultures can be as simple integrating small accessories or wall hangings or having a themed room.

For those on the more conservative side, small stylized reminders of the chosen culture would be the best way to begin the spatial evolution. Photographs, mementos, heirlooms or even books increase the cultural level of a space and being subtlety teaching those visiting.

Themed rooms can carry a cultural theme that indulges the five senses and creates an experience for anyone who inhabits the space or visits. Museums are a great example of where this technique is used successfully. Themed rooms can be used to educate the public about historic moments in time or cultures on the other side of the world.

Culture begins to leave clues about the person residing in a space and can be a great way to share ancestral stories and keep history alive.

Wasting Water

Tonight changed the way I think about water. Sometimes we go through life and all of a sudden everything clicks together. Tonight was one of those moments for me. As I’ve mentioned, I am studying for the LEED exam, but it’s more that just an exam for me. It’s a way of gaining knowledge to make the best decisions possible when designing a space, not just for the occupants, but also for our resources. The USGBC had a great event this evening regarding water conservation and use.

Rain running off our buildings and homes doesn’t get a chance to penetrate the soil before it’s ushered into the sewer system and whisked off to the Gulf of Mexico through various rivers, channels and canals. Instead of being harvested, water is being treated as a waste product and it’s getting worse as time goes on. Americans pay the least amount for water, but use the most in the world. The amount of water wasted alone from leaking pipes underground throughout the United States is the equivalent to what the state of California uses in a year.

This is staggering. To imagine how much damage the runoff causes, loss of vegetation, erosion and altering habitats for organisms, aquatic life and animals near water.

Simply capturing water and using it for irrigation in our yards would help alleviate how much water is being wasted. Rain barrels are gaining popularity, and for good reason. Coming in different shapes and sizes, rain barrels hold water that can be used later for lawn care and to tend to gardens. Rain water is naturally soft and void of the calcium and magnesium that causes water to be hard. Using soft water in irrigation is much better for the plants not only because it occurs naturally, but because the reduced levels of chemicals in rain water means that less fertilizer is needed (if any at all) which effects the quality of the runoff. The absence of fertilizer means that the river banks will be able to keep it’s ecosystem and erosion will be minimized.

Rain barrels are a great place to start, but there are also other systems that are available to increase the amount of water going into the soil as opposed to sewers. Green roofs absorb the water and use it for its own ecosystem, permeable surfaces used with below grade rain capturing systems, allow large amounts of water to be stored and used when needed, all help water to be managed effectively.

For more information on this check out the USGBC and Aquascape’s Rain Exchange system.

Energy and Atmosphere

Reading about the LEED process, I was surprised to learn that most LEED points are not met in the energy and atmosphere category. Isn’t that what LEED is all about? Afterall LEED stands for leadership in energy and environmental design.

Energy conservation is becoming more of an issue every day. It’s important that we strive to make the best use of the resources we have to preserve our environment for generations to come. It’s time to accept the challenges and the difficult credits in green design, it’s not about the points, or the rating, it’s about doing the right thing.

For more information about what AIA is doing to help with this endeavor click here.

Products to Increase Productivity

As a commercial designer who frequently works with office environment, I know how important productivity is to a company.There are so many tools out there that are designed to compress realestate, increase productivity and empower their employees.
The evolution of the office is rather interesting. From steel stand alone desks to the first cubical, and now to see cubicals as we know them to revolutionize the way people interact and function. The typical (term used to describe a single workstation) footprint is shrinking, from the trends of yesterday giving each employee a generous 120 square feet, to the trends today that give an amployee around 64 square feet, the office environment is changing. Many companies are allowing their employees to work remotely and now the work place is everywhere, the beach, a park, library and even a client’s space. It’s important to understand the treands to understand how we can assist in making people more productive.
While the workstation is shrinking, people are getting more done today than yesterday. While our paperless society ironicaly requires more paper than ever, realestate costs continue to rise, we need to get more creative with how we work. Research has been done that shows the majority of people like to pile, they keep their active projects near and within arms reach. The only time paper finds it’s way into a laterfile cabinet, is when it’s no longer accessed, but used for back-up records. We call these people pilers and filers. Details, a Steelcase Company is one of the many manufacturers in the marketplace that is creating products to help the pilers of the world. Developing a wall system that uses horizontal slats, they use different work tools that can be reconfigured to help the employee. The worktools keep papers, phones, pencils, CD’s, DVD’s and more off the desk allowing for more useable desk space, thus allowing the worksurface become smaller and lending the workstation to support the realestate ompression trend.
Productivity is hindered when technology fails or the workplace is in dissarry. Systems furniture now comes easy to assemble, sometimes with few tools. Tour, a product from Turnstone is a great example of how furniture doesn’t have to be complicated. It assembles quickly and the employees can change the configuration within minutes to hours depending on what they are doing.
Steelcase has also developed a new collaborative product that integrates technology with the need to share information. Media:scape is a product designed with the mobile user in mid. It’s a large table that allows you to connect your laptop up to a large TV and share information. With the touch of a button, the people meeting can switch between computers allowing for a fluid exchange of information.
Helping staff become more productive means creating spaces that multitask. Its necessary to solve for each unique circumstance in the most efficient way, whether that’s the most creative solution, or the most basic. There are countless tools in the industry to help make workers more productive.

Company Culture

Company cultures vary, while some are unbelievably conservative, others are extraordinarily liberal. Having to work on various projects for all types of clients, sometimes I notice disjointedness between the interior design of the office space and the people who reside within it.

When a company chooses to ignore the social culture and chooses not to incorporate that into their interior branding, they are truly doing themselves a disservice. Having an office interior that supports the culture naturally supports how work is being completed and the general productivity rate. As occupants have to fight with their environment, something will be sacrificed, that is productivity.

LEED Beginnings

Tomorrow begins a six week journey into the wonderful world of an intense LEED Green Associate webinar training. Through the six week course, we should be well equipped to take the LEED GA exam. Believing we never stop learning, I scooped up the opportunity to join this group.

Through my reading this past week, the idea of an integrated design approach has been engraved into my brain. All the reading assignments have spoken about the importance of having a unified team in the beginning.

This reminds me a great deal of how I prefer to work on projects, green or not. Being as close to the beginning of the process as possible makes interior design much easier and saves the client money at the end of the process.

An interior designer saves time and helps to create continuity through the entire project as opposed to trying to make separate elements work together instead of fighting each other. It’s a better use resources and creates a better end product.

Many clients try to save money by bringing a designer into the process once the project is underway and they have already spoken to a general contractor. While this will work, its much more beneficial for the designer to be introduced when site selection is being made. An interior designer can assist in these first steps to ensure that adequate square footage is leased and will make the most of the space chosen. The designer will also provide schematic layouts in preparation for furniture placement and prepare bid documents for furniture and construction. While an interior designer may sound like an unnecessary expense so early, they are necessary to make the space more efficient.

Too Much?

There is a project that I am currently working on where the occupants have a high need for storage. While this is not uncommon in the world of interior design, usually the interior designer can realize the actual need for the storage being requested. After interviewing a good representation of people occupying this department, it became clear this storage was needed, and needed in close proximity to the workstations. The building was not built to accommodate such a heavy floor load, so the solution would not be as simple as using high file cabinets to achieve the storage needed. This requires a much more unique solution.

While my storage project progresses, this occurs in many spaces across the world. We always want more for less and have incredible expectations for the things we have and the people we work with. Unconventional solutions are the best way to deal with such obstacles in interior design.