Courts And Beds And Slides, Oh My! The State Of Workplace Amenities & Designs Post-COVID

It’s 8am, you’ve just woken up, you have an in-person meeting at 9am and your home is at least an hour commute away from the office… BUT panic does not ensue because you’ve spent the night in one of the bedrooms inside your office building. What may have been viewed as a crazy workplace concept 20 years ago is now a reality, as investments in workplace niceties continue to grow. Office amenities have grown exponentially since the 2010s – especially since 2020 – as occupant experience and wellbeing have become a focal point for real estate executives. Let’s dive into some of the most interesting workplace amenities and concepts featured in the market today.

Many amenities are now seen as commonplace, such as free coffee or breakfast and wellness rooms; landlords and businesses are thus adding more unique amenities to differentiate their spaces. For example, in response to the growing number of commuters staying late in the city, flexible workspace provider Office Space in Town (OSiT) recently added five bedrooms to its Monument site in London. This builds on the existing trend of organizations, especially technology firms, offering nap areas for workers – take Google’s Australian office and Facebook’s London headquarters. Zappos also offers nap pods as part of its broader wellness programme, which features yoga classes, meditation rooms and a jam room filled with different instruments. Other amenities on the rise include luxury cafeterias, on-site childcare and courts for basketball or pickleball. For example, Dropbox’s 4,000 square foot gourmet cafeteria at its Austin office features cuisines from around the world made by top chefs. Barclays’s office in Whippany includes expanded dining facilities, a fitness centre with massage therapy facilities, and a day care centre. Many of Google’s offices feature rock-climbing walls and slides between floors, providing employees with interesting alternative transportation options.

In addition to providing unique amenities, firms are using innovative workplace designs to make their offices stand out, from the inside and the outside. According to a Censuswide survey of 2,000 workers, 73% of respondents prefer to work in a location near water and green spaces, and 69% of workers find creative and innovative ideas come easier if they’ve been around green spaces. In response to this biophilic design trend, organizations have started incorporating nature inside and outside offices. For instance, SelgasCano’s office in Spain immerses workers in nature, with the office inside a ‘transparent tube’ on the floor of the woods, featuring curved windows and walls made of transparent acrylic. Taking it a step further, OVO Energy built a treehouse inside the lobby of its Bristol office. Firms are also taking their offices to the water. For example, the Pionen White Mountain data centre facility was built from a former nuclear bunker under water. The facility’s interior is on an artificial day-night cycle, and features greenhouse plants, multiple waterfalls, a 2,600 litre fishtank and a conference room suspended in-air above a server hall. The Floating Office Rotterdam is a solar-energy-powered floating office that proves scenic views of the harbour.

The future of office spaces holds many possibilities, as firms transform workplaces from spaces where employees have to be into spaces where employees want to be.

For more insights on the future of offices, see Verdantix Future Of Office Space (North America).