INFINITE SPACE_ OFFICE BUILDING
Fentress Compitition: Future Workspace
Site : Eastern Water-Front_ Mumbai
Drawings: individual
Type : Team Work
CONCEPT: A fluid, continuous form is designed that blurs the boundaries, both between different departments of an organization, and between interior spaces and landscape. Core ideas include handheld devices which will allow an unprecedented mobility, and ease of functionality for the employee. A sustainable approach is used to design, which will help make the workplace cost-effective and self-sufficient, while the open form will make it spacious and production-effective.
The design incorporates a truly sustainable outlook to the workplace of the future. Furthermore, since the program requires the site to be used 24 hours a day, the energy generation by active means will consequently also be a continuous process. Project works as a ‘grid’, where energy is constantly produced and consumed by various activities. Also the skin at various parts is made of fins that rotate due to constant wind blowing at the eastern waterfront, generating large amounts of energy.
Workplaces today function in a set hierarchy which determines the responsibilities of individual employees at different levels. Unfortunately this hierarchy also permeates the realm of the built workspace and assigns fixed cubicles, cabins and rooms to the employees. This creates an office space where most employees never use more than 10 - 20% of the total office area. A static, fixed workspace with a computer that essentially anchors the employee down to one place is an obsolete technology. The design looks at the future workplace where this counterproductive segregation and dissection is done away with. A Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) office was chosen for the program as this industry has still to recognize the employee as a key member of the organization, and thus afford him a lively and engaging workplace.
The design is a set of seamless loops, free from physical hierarchy. A more informal open space is envisaged, where the employee can experience all aspects of the workplace and create his own space whenever, wherever and however he requires it. Meetings, training sessions and discussions take place more informally, nurturing creativity as well as fostering a feeling of well being. The bottom most loop growing from the landscape digging under--ground is used for more private office spaces. The site chosen lies on the Eastern waterfront of Mumbai, India, adjacent to an upcoming ferry terminal. The Eastern waterfront of Mumbai today houses mostly warehouses for the port, and is, as such a defunct part of the city. The land surrounding the structure is an open-to-public park, which allows the employees to spill out their activities in the midst of nature as well as provides a much needed recreational open space for the citizens of the city.
A fluid, continuous form is designed that blurs the boundaries, both between different departments of an organization, and between interior spaces and landscape. A more informal open space is envisaged, where the employee can experience all aspects of the workplace and create his own space whenever, wherever and however he requires it. Meetings, training sessions and discussions take place more informally; nurturing creative thought as well as creating a feeling of well-being.
The workplace of the future will use technologies that will optimize the employees’ output and make the organization space - effective at the same time. Increasing portability and processing power will allow personal tablets and cell phones to be able to perform all the varied tasks required of a desktop computer today.
The design incorporates a truly sustainable outlook to the workplace of the future. Furthermore, since the program requires the site to be used 24 hours a day, the energy generation by active means will consequently also be a continuous process. Project works as a ‘grid’, where energy is constantly produced and consumed by various activities. Also the skin at various parts is made of fins that rotate due to costant wind blowing at the eastern waterfront, generating large amounts of energy.