Modern Approaches for Open-Plan Office

Ambiance and comfort in open-plan office through modern approaches: People are individuals and differ in their personal preferences and needs, but everyone should feel comfortable in the built environment. Every user has unique expectations of a room in which he or she is to stay and brings an individual tolerance level along. In indefinite periods of time a person can adapt, but also experience changes in needs. Rigid systems provide conditions, are oriented towards fixed values, but do not adapt to individual needs. People, however, feel most comfortable if they can influence their environment themselves, e.g. change temperature, air movement or brightness.
A large building can offer different areas which allow users to be comfortable within varying levels of quality. With modern mobility, users can find a place that best suits their needs. Combined with additional possibilities of individual influence, places are created that promise to combine productive work with a new level of satisfaction. This concept utilizes and connects topics from Inhabitation Practices, Adaptive Architecture and Adaptive Environment. Axel Springer's new campus aims to achieve this. The project team had to reconcile a sophisticated spatial structure with a central atrium and highly transparent facade with the necessary visual and thermal comfort.

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Photo: Nils Koenning