As open plan workspaces proliferate, stadium seating has begun to pop up as a new design trend in corporate offices.

Modeled loosely on the metal tiered seats found in sports stadiums or high school gyms, stadium seating has been updated as a sleek design element for the office. The seating style first emerged in open-plan schools, serving as a combination of seating area and play area for children. It gained immediate popularity, functioning as a “town square” for the school by combining efficiency and fun.

From tech-startups and museums to restaurants and coffee shops

Stadium seating is also seen in outdoor settings such as New York City’s Highline as well as in trendy fast-casual restaurants, museums, coffee shops, and tech startups.

The design element has now found its way into corporate offices that employ an open office plan and strive to emphasize collaboration. The seating design offers a flexible meeting place that can facilitate independent work, small group meetings, company-wide brainstorms and learning/training sessions. It functions as an informal gathering space while also providing a location for office-wide announcements and meetings.

Stadium seating highlights transparency while creating workspace flexibility

Many tenants find that the seating creates an environment that promotes productivity, healthy office culture, and collaboration. It highlights transparency while creating workspace flexibility by encouraging casual office meetups and communication. As a design element, it maintains site lines and an open feeling for an office while also creating a natural divider between different work areas.

As more and more offices incorporate less traditional design solutions, from nap pods and relaxation rooms to walking trails and on-site food service, workspaces have become places where staff can combine work and play. Stadium seating parallels this trend, offering a place where employees can hang out or work on a project.

Meanwhile, the seating style helps companies present a workplace that encourages organic communication that feels more casual, effortless, and doesn’t feel like an office. Stadium seating may well continue to grow in popularity as it functions for a variety of commercial spaces.

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2. What services does Rapt Studio offer?
 
We design elegant solutions, develop meaningful experiences and bring about deeper connections between people, spaces and brands. Because our relationships with brands are multi-facetted, we bring multiple expertise to bare on every challenge and design holistic and genuine expressions of a company’s brand and culture, which comes in many shapes and sizes – Virtual, digital and physical.
 
3. You have office locations in San Francisco and Los Angeles.  Are there any noticeable differences between these two locations in terms of clients and architecture styles?
 
And now New York. There are definitely differences in each market, locally, but we are also doing work all over the country as well as internationally from our three studios, so our being located there is as much about being able to attract talent who wants to live in each of those places as it is to do work for local clients. Having said that, the three locations are particularly sophisticated design markets so I wouldn’t overplay the importance of a local style, but instead strategic needs associated with strong local markets – with the Bay Area leading the way in the Technology arena, Los Angeles focused on Media Tech and Entertainment, and New York being the center of the Financial and Fashion world.
 

4. You have been building and designing offices for the biggest global companies such as Dropbox, LinkedIn, Google, Adobe. Why do you feel they choose you as their main architect & designer?
 
Our practice is varied – Focusing on brand and design strategy and the design of meaningful and genuine experiences. Whether we are designing a workplace and the important connections between the staff and the unique culture of the company or a pop-up retail space and a powerful brand experience necessary to tell a compelling story to the customer in a moment, or a hotel or restaurant and the immersive lifestyle portrayed within it’s walls, we strive to make meaningful connections. The best brands in the world, realize that employee and customer engagement is key and look for partners to assist them in telling their story. We are story tellers and I think that is what attracts the incredible list of clients that we have been lucky enough to work with.
 
5. What do you think are the current office design trends?
 
I cringe a little when I hear the word “trend” – maybe because I expect the next sentence to announce the use of chocolate brown, peacock green and peppercorn and to predict the dominance of fringe and tassels. But trends are important as they put a light on the way people use spaces; the way they live, work and play. We look for this data as we work with companies to try and predict and design for new ways of working and different ways of seeing space.
 

6. Many companies (especially in a tech) invest enormous amount of money into their office environment. Why is that and can we say that having a cool looking office helps you attract the best talent?
 
Of course, having a “cool looking office” helps to attract talent, but cool looking is not enough. If a meaningful connection is not forged between a workplace and your staff, between a store or even a website and your customer then the money is not well spent. If you are cold and wet and spend a small fortune on a gorgeous coat that is neither waterproof of warm enough, then it’s beauty is not meaningful. The most successful companies know that spending the right amount of money and engaging in the right degree of discovery will uncover the correct balance.
 
7. What are some common mistakes companies looking for a new office often do?
 
They think that cool is enough.
 
8.  Let’s say I have a rapidly growing company, I know nothing about architecture and design, but want to have my office to be completely built by Rapt Studio. How would the whole process look like? How do we start? 
 
We believe in the power of strategic design to propel a brand’s message, to tell compelling stories, and to transform and reinvent. We don’t just design for “pretty” but design elegant and efficient solutions to our client’s most complex problems. The process starts with Discovery – our opportunity to truly unearth our client’s DNA, what they believe in, why they exist. We dig deep, skirting the inevitable jump to space, and focus on business and cultural drivers. When start with an in-depth understanding of what this company/brand means to its employees or customers, why they matter, and what unique series of personality traits, operational and cultural rituals – their WHY – then we have a great foundation on which to build a great project. This then allows for every move, every design strategy to build towards the ultimate solution. You never get an opportunity to go back and asked an important, but ignored question, so we take the time upfront to assure a transformational, inspiring and meaningful design.
 

9. Are you able to help with furnishing as well?
 
We are a full service, interdisciplinary studio, providing holistic and complete solutions including, but not limited to space, furnishings, graphic design, wayfinding, digital and video, as well as marketing and virtual platforms. To analyze interactions and to not specify the tools used to foster those interactions would designing a great looking car with no engine.
 
10. What do you think is the future of workspaces? 
 
Ugh. That questions haunts me. I guess I am not sure why it is relevant. As long as companies continue to do the work, to take a good long look at what makes them unique, compelling, what makes them matter and making decisions around workplace based on this, then we are on the right track.
 

11. Do you think there will be a moment in the future, where offices will be gone and people will work and communicate primarily from their home offices?
 
NO
 
12. How do you feel about coworking?
 
I think that the concept of the coworking space is great – for the same reason that I believe that there will never be a future when the office disappears in lieu of everyone working from home, alone. People are social beings – they thrive off of each other’s energies, share each other’s skills and talents and learn from each other.
 

13. Do you think it is just a trend or the future for many companies? For example, to keep the costs down.
 
I think that there is a strong future.
 
14. Is there any new interesting product or a project you are currently working on?
 
We introduced a product line at ICFF (International Contemporary Furniture Fair) this year for the contract market (available soon) as well as continuing to work on great projects for the best brands in the world. Stay tuned.
 

15. The best office space you have ever seen?
 
I just won’t answer that one, as some of the best photographed workplaces are some of the worst performing.
 

16. Thank you for your time David
 
Thank you
 

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Hello Ilkka, could you please briefly introduce Framery to our readers?

We create happy, productive workplaces by supplying sound privacy to open-plan offices

Currently, we have two solutions: Framery O and Framery Q. Framery O phonebooth is a perfect solution to have your discussions in privacy without disturbing your colleagues (for example, making important calls and participating in video conferences) Framery Q meeting pod allows people to have 2-4 person meetings, brainstorming sessions and important one-on-one conversations in private without disturbing the whole office.

You are a Finnish company founded in 2010, but your main market is probably in the U.S right? What brands and companies are you currently cooperating with?
 
Our products are available globally through over 140 of our licensed dealers around the world. The US is of course a strong market for us. In the US our products are used by Uber, Microsoft, Cloudera, Oracle, Dow Jones, CIC, PWC and Deloitte to mention a few.
 

Your main product is this beautifully designed soundproof private booth. What exactly does this thing do?
 
Framery O is our one person, soundproof phonebooth. Framery O is perfect for having your discussions in privacy so you don’t disturb your colleagues. Framery O is also a great place to concentrate on your own work in a noisy environment.
 
The booth includes all the equipment you need to make things easy – a table top, air ventilation system, electric socket and LED lighting. Framery O delivers an echo-free, fresh and comfortable working environment. Full specifications can be found on our website. You can also try out different designs of your own dream office phone booth on our product configurator: https://configurator.frameryacoustics.com
 
When and how did you come with the idea of developing Framery O?
 
Big ideas sometimes begin from rather mundane insights. The founders of Framery were constantly being disrupted in their work by their boss talking loudly on his phone in their office. This made it extremely hard to focus on demanding tasks. Realising that they weren’t the only ones suffering from these kinds of distractions, they decided to fix this problem by developing a soundproof phone booth and starting out as entrepreneurs. After hard work, countless hours of development and tireless rounds of iterations, Framery O was born.
 

 
What material are the booths made of? It seems to me it is probably very expensive to manufacture something like this…
 
The glass elements of the booth are sound control laminated glass. The exterior of the booth is painted sheet metal or brushed stainless steel. Frame is made of formica laminate on birch plywood with varnish trim. Walls and roof of the Framery O are a sandwich element of sheet metal, birch plywood, recycled acoustic foam and acoustic felt.
 
All materials and designs are carefully selected to a very high-quality standards to make sound insulation effective and the product pleasing to use and integrate as a beautiful part of your office. Producing high-quality products is of course always expensive, but we thrive to keep our prices affordable and competitive.
 
What do you think are the current office design trends?
 
Office design is shifting away from open plan only solutions to more human-centric offices that enable various kinds of work task to be completed effectively in the same place. Instead of either-or solutions, offices are designed to accommodate different uses in harmony.
 
Designers are more and more realizing the need to make design choices in a human-centric way: making the office adapt to different kinds of working styles and task instead of forcing the worker to adapt to an office that doesn’t support modern knowledge work.
 

 
These days many companies invest a big amount of money into their office environment. What do you think is the main reason for that?
 
Most of us spend around 40 hours at work each week. Much of this time is spent at the office. Naturally, this means that the office has to be a place where great work gets done and where employees feel happy and productive. I think we can all agree that this is a worthwhile thing to invest in.
 
I think that it’s not about having a cool looking office per say. It’s more about having an office that accommodates the needs of modern knowledge work and is a pleasant and productive environment for employees to spend their days. The excitement of having ping pong tables and all the latest gadgets fades away quick, but having a functional (and cool looking) office space carries on much longer.
 
Aesthetics, is of course, important at first, when attracting the best talent, but the foundations have to be in order too. The office needs to be a place that allows great and fulfilling work to get done, not just a cool looking place.
 
What are the common mistakes companies make when looking for a new office space?
 
A common mistake is to have a strict either/or philosophy about the design of a certain space. The office is often considered either a fully open plan office with fixed meeting rooms or it is a collection of office rooms.
 
The same office real estate can accommodate a wide variety of uses with human-centric design and non-fixed solutions like phone booths and meeting pods. With non-fixed solutions, the same space can also be altered to offer a solution to changing demands in the future, with minimal costs.
 
What do you think is the future of workspaces?
 
In the future, office real estate is a resource that is used more efficiently. Gone are the days of massive open plan offices full of wasted square meters of dysfunctional space. The design of the space is also done in a manner that enables the layout of the office to adapt to changing demands, for example, by utilizing non-fixed furniture & meeting rooms, phone booths and other elements that can be rearranged easily.
  
Do you think there will be a moment in the near future, where people will work exclusively from their homes?
 
Working flexibly from home or other places other than the office will become more common, but the office won’t probably go anywhere. Digital communication and telecommuting have advantages, but so does human to human interaction and collaboration in real life. The way that the office is designed will however change to better enable collaboration and deep concentration in the same space.
 

 
How do you feel about this recent coworking trend? It seems like working in coworking environment is becoming a preferable choice not only for creatives and professionals but also for many large, established companies…
 
Co-working spaces that are designed in a human-centric way, are great for various kinds of creatives and professionals. The existence of co-working environments reflects that office spaces and human to human connections still have a place in the modern working environment. For global companies that have people in various locations, it is a great option to have satellite offices in co-working spaces, rather than forcing people to move to their main office locations.
 
Do you think coworking could be the future of workspaces?
 
Office space is expensive, and most of the real estate is often unused or it’s utilised very little. In the future, companies will use the available real estate more effectively to accommodate different types of uses and work tasks in a productive way.
 
Let’s say a company wants to buy 5 of your phone booths and have them installed in their offices. What do they need to do and how does the whole process look like?
 
The first thing to do, is to visit our online configurator: https://configurator.frameryacoustics.com
 
There you can configure our own dream office phone booth. Once you have a design set, you can request an offer. We will answer the request in cooperation with our local dealers.
 
You can test drive the phone booth at any of our 140 local dealers around the world. Once you have made your decision, the phone booths can be delivered in 2 weeks at the fastest (depending on your location). The phone booths can be assembled during a normal work day without any inconvenience to your normal business. Assembly is included.
 
Thank you for your time
 
Thank you
 

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Hello Reto, could you please introduce yourself and your company to our readers? What exactly do you do?

Hello! As you said, my name is Reto Eberle and I’m the founder and owner of dTank. dTank is a custom furniture company that creates custom furniture from conceptual design to installation. We collaborate with interior designers and architects to create unique and innovative furniture. We begin by taking the clients and designers vision and using our talents as furniture designers, engineers and manufacturers to turn it into reality. We focus on pushing the boundaries of design and fabrication.

dTank was founded in 1998, how has the typical office evolved since then?

In 1998 we experienced the dot-com boom where technology companies, particularly in the San Francisco and Silicon Valley area were breaking out of the common cubicle designs and wanting more open, collaborative, fun spaces that got their creative juices flowing. The furniture designs were experimental and we were creating furniture out of unusual materials such as parachute fabric, street signs, light posts, and more! Around 2001, during the collapse of the dot-com era, we got more involved with advertising agencies. The advertising industry really set the tone for branding interiors. They emphasized creating an office environment that showed their client’s how they can apply their talents and creativity to their space. As the years have gone by, company’s, particularly workspaces, have adopted an open space environment. Privacy isn’t as important anymore. Private offices and privacy panels went away and people were more comfortable sitting closer to each other. Today, we see trends of benching with long tables and collaborative spaces like communal tables. If it’s one thing we learned from being around for almost two decades is that history repeats itself and a lot of designs are revived with a more modern twist. Because we work directly with the designers and the clients, we get a clear idea of how the company and the staff work so we’re able to come up with designs that set future trends.

You are originally from Switzerland, a beautiful country in Europe. What has brought you to the United States in 90’s?

Switzerland is a beautiful country with a great healthcare system where you can create a lovely life for yourself however, I was driven by entrepreneurship and at the time Switzerland was not the right place for that. Today with places like Berlin, London and Paris, you have greater opportunities in Europe but it was not the case in 80s. I actually grew up in the furniture industry with my family so I was always passionate about furniture so I chose to come to America in the 90s and explore my options. Living in America I’ve learned that if you work hard and are passionate about your career goals, the opportunities open up for you.

What do you think are the current office design trends?

We create furniture for all types of environments and industries so it varies. In the office space industry we see a lot of long benches and sit-stand tables. When I started in the 90’s, ergonomic office chairs were a big deal and now it’s the desks. The sit-stand desks are getting more and more affordable so we see them often. That said, we always caution people that having sit-stand systems are just one way to help prevent injuries but they do not make a great difference alone. Companies that spend the time to teach their employees how to use their ergonomic furniture, encourage breaks, use alternative working options like a motion chair rather than a static chair. Another trend we see often are collaborative spaces like huddle rooms and open seating spaces.

Many tech companies invest enormous amount of money into their office environment. What do you think is the reason for that and can we say that having a cool looking office helps you to attract the best talent?

Nowadays, there is a lot of money spent on the design and functionality of an office because of the benefits that come with that. Outside of providing your employees with a cool looking office, you need to make it functional and inspiring. A lot of design firms will spend a lot of time studying how people interact with an office space from how they work on the computer, file paperwork, use the printer, and even eat their lunch. They create a space that helps the majority of it’s employees get the best experience. And by this, it naturally attracts talent and also retains talents by indirectly telling them, they matter.

What are the common mistakes companies looking for a new office design do?

A common mistake I see are companies spending a majority of their budget on lounge spaces or lobbies because they are typically the spaces that directly face their customers or clients. I believe there should be a focus on where employees spend most of their time. Generally, companies feel like employee spaces are where they can save money. If you consider the fact that employees spend 40+ hours a week at their desks, spending time and design efforts of these areas may impact the longevity and health of employees which in turn will save a lot of money.

Let’s say I have a tech company and I want to have my office space to be designed by your company. How does the design process look like these days?

Our primary concern is the furniture and we rely on our A&D partners to design. We collaborate with them so the furniture and space are designed as one. Generally the interior designers and architects bring us into projects as a part of their team, just like they would bring in a technical consultant. We work with them to see what piece of furniture would work best as custom. We work hand-in-hand with them to create conceptual designs until it is exactly what they want and then move into manufacturing all the way into installation. dTank is actually short for design tank and our mission is always to create an environment and follow a process that is very collaborative. We work closely with experts whether it be designers, engineers, fabricators, manufacturers, to create furniture and a space that is functional, creative and of course looks great!

What do you think is the future of workspaces?

As I said earlier, history repeats itself, so I would not be surprised to see trends from the past coming back again. That said, in more recent times, workspaces have gotten more minimal with concrete floors and open ceilings where the cons of limited privacy and poor acoustics will be addressed. Adding private spaces and acoustical panels while keeping the open space feel will become more and more relevant. It’s also important to look ahead into the future of what new jobs are going to be created. We always take some to research and learn how they will work and how it may affect our industry.

Do you think there will be a moment in the future, where offices will be gone and people will work and communicate primarily from their home offices?

Home offices and overall off-site working is not a new thing and although it’s become more and more relevant and established, it does not work for everybody. There is a large group of companies and employers within those companies that need to be apart of a corporate culture and collaborative environment. We definitely see the convenience of working from home and it can benefit certain employees a lot, for example, cutting down their commute time or allowing them to set their own hours. The cons of home offices, however, are that many times the setting of the office is not appropriately addressed. If an employee is sitting at their kitchen table for 8+ hours a day, they will notice the negative affects it has on their body and work in no time. It’s important to make sure your furniture is ergonomic, your space is designated only for work, and that it allows for proper functionality and productivity.

How do you feel about co-working spaces? It seems like working in co-working environment is becoming a preferable choice for many creatives and professionals, but also for some companies that set up offices in co-working spaces, and let their employees work from there

Before “co-working,” businesses had the option of renting out office suites, so it’s not necessarily a new trend. I definitely believe there is a need for it. There are businesses, especially start ups that simply cannot afford leasing their own space. At a certain point, those businesses may transition to their own space but some, particularly smaller business may be content with co-working for the long haul. Some people, however, don’t work well around a lot of noise or being surrounded by other people, so co-working may not be the best option for them. The great part about co-working is that provides an option for those that may need it. Providing options is what dTank is based off of. We are able to provide our client’s options that are best fit for them because we create furniture rather than sell already made furniture.

Do you think it is only a current trend or is it the future for many companies? For example to keep the costs down, as you just said?

For smaller companies, co-working is the best fit in regards to saving money. Generally, they don’t have the capital to lease a space and pay for all the things that come with it. I personally don’t believe co-working is a trend that will go away. There may be more now than there was before but it will never go away. Like all workspace solutions, it may evolve with the times but the problem it is currently solving will always exist.

You will be launching a new product that should help companies with the office acoustics. Could you please introduce it to our readers? What does this product do?

Acoustics is something that has generally always been addressed but in current times, because of the open office space, it’s needed more than before. The best way to describe is there are times that you go to a restaurant and regardless of the amount of people around and the noise level, sometimes you are truly bothered by the sound and other times it’s just background noise. When the noise bothers you, it is because the space has not appropriately addressed their acoustical issues. The noise made within the space travels and bounces against hard surfaces and redirects the sound cause noise reverberations and echoes.

We’ve created a product that not only solves this issue using acoustical core material by trapping and absorbing the sound rather than redirecting it, but have made with a few properties that make unique to the market.

We understand that spaces, particularly commercial, want to be visually appealing. So instead of just wrapping our acoustical panels with a colored or patterned fabric, we print art on an acoustically transparent fabric, hence the products name of Acoustical Art. We provide clients a gallery of hundreds of art options, from photography collage art to gradient art. We can also create custom art for our clients who want to brand their space or tell the story of their company or use art that our clients provide.

The other unique capability of our system is the frame. We use a very innovative aluminum frame system that allows our clients to display the art in a variety of configurations. You can hang it against the wall, suspend it from the ceiling horizontally or vertically, float it in a space, or make it freestanding. We provide all these configurations so that our architect and designer clients have flexibility when it comes to fitting this product seamlessly within their space.

Acoustical Art is all about creating “art with a function.” Solving acoustical issues while displaying beautiful art. It addresses all the desirable and advantageous elements from art and acoustics to flexibility, adaptability, personalization and individualism.

Your company also makes and sells a custom furniture. What kind of furniture can you exactly make? And who is your typical customer?

The custom furniture we make is mostly for commercial applications within workspace, healthcare, hospitality and education industries. We can furnish the entire area starting from reception areas to conference rooms, into private offices, to kitchens. When working with commercial design studios, the industries and the furniture requests can be simple to complex. In workspaces, we’ve made workstations, reception desks, huddle spaces; in healthcare spaces, we’ve made nursing stations, casework, physicians tables; in hospitality, we’ve made display shelves, wine storages, dining tables; in education, we’ve made auditorium seating, computer desks, lounge seating. We can design and build any piece that can realistically be engineered and fabricated. Our focus is on making commercial grade furniture so that it can hold up and be long lasting within the space. Each piece is custom for each client and is never repeated.

The best office space you have ever seen?
That’s a hard question! Each client and company is so different from the other especially when it comes to showcasing their personality within their design. Generally the best spaces I have seen, have a visually appealing design with branding, are functional, have good acoustics, and the furniture blends well within the space. I have seen a great deal of spaces that fit in this description, so fortunately there isn’t just one!

Thank you for your time Reto

Thank you Michal

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