The Brief
Co-working is built on the open plan. Legal work is built on confidentiality.
Quod Architects collaborated with Charcoal Architects and the co-working operator Found8 to design the world's first dedicated co-working space for lawyers. The premise carried a contradiction. The co-working model rests on the open-plan office, and legal work, by its nature, cannot.
Rather than place desks in an open floor, the studio designed compact, private modular work pods. Each pod holds two workstations and storage shelving, and can be locked if required. The result is a shared workplace that still respects the confidential nature of the work done inside it.
The private work pod
The pod is the building block of the scheme. Compact enough to be efficient, large enough for two desktops and storage shelves, and lockable when the work demands it. Alongside the dedicated pods, breakout areas offer hot-desking, each station fitted with privacy panels.
The Office, Rethought
A model for the workplace after the open plan.
01
Multiple entrances
More than one way in, to reduce congestion during peak hours and keep arrival and departure unhurried.
02
Self-sufficient clusters
The office splits into clusters, each with its own pantry, toilet and meeting rooms, so interaction between clusters stays limited.
03
Lower-density desking
Work desks are set a safe distance apart and more enclosed than an open plan would allow. Meeting rooms follow the same logic.
04
Contactless doors
Doors that open without touch, a small detail of a workplace planned for how offices were beginning to change.
A model for what comes next
The studio designed the space with a view of where offices were heading: a mix of dedicated workspaces at lower density and rotational hot desks with storage. The lawyers' co-working space is a working prototype of that idea.
PlanThe floor split into self-sufficient clusters, each with its own amenities.
DetailThe work pod, sized for two and planned for privacy.
In Closing
Shared space, private work
The brief asked the studio to reconcile two things that do not usually sit together: the economics of co-working and the confidentiality of legal practice.
The lockable pod, repeated and clustered, is the answer. A floor that is shared, and work that stays private.
Q.E.D.