Tom.B

A happy Client

THE CHALLENGE

Design a new Coworking Space in the Heart of Dubai that imbues openness and enthusiasm.

THE OUTCOME

An entirely new headquarters and a reimagining of the company’s existing building, both focused on helping team members collaborate.

For this Project we broke down all the elements of the space, including everything from flexible wall configurations to nature-inspired fabric choices that brought the outside in.

At  the core of our  decision-making was the intersection of environment and behavior:

1. How could a certain configuration of desks help new ideas to bubble up?
2. How might the transparency of the boardroom walls encourage executives to make more collaborative decisions?

Traditional Korean business culture places a strong emphasis on hierarchy, but in WDM we think that teams worked better when they arranged seating areas in ways that decentralized the boss.

Coworkers had felt isolated from those in other business units, so the designers created room for impromptu gatherings outside common meeting spaces.

Everything from functional needs, like toothbrush storage, to features that encouraged cross-pollination of ideas, like a set of shelves where departments could share examples of their work with other units, was taken into account.

On this Project we wanted to Re-use materials and spaces, to bring in a sense of ethical design, All wall papers and wood finishes comes from sustainable suppliers and have Low Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC).

Also, nature comes into the interior with the vertical garden on the entrance.

To improve the indoor air quality, it’s important that the air in a room can regularly circulate and remain fresh.

The Vertical Garden act as natural air filter.

We designed a space that have teams sharing amenities like conference rooms, call booths, and support service stations, and we also left room for spontaneous interactions and conversations away from the desk like the Mezzanine net.

The Coffee Shop enriches the design and create new opportunities like learning and development that brings diverse employee groups together, and we all know how a good coffee can save a long meeting.

The post Dubai Co-Working Space Design Case Study appeared first on Guillermo Blanco Interior Designer.

– Guillermo Blanco

Guillermo studied Interior Architecture in Madrid and from a young age he has been working designing some of the most emblematic properties and clubs in Madrid of the late 80’s and 90’s. Between his notable projects is Penelope Cruz’s clothing shop in Madrid. He has been living in the Middle East for the last decade and he is now sharing with us his experience of designing for the Middle East clientele.

You are originally from Spain, have lived in Thailand and are now based in Dubai. How did you adapt working in new environments with clients having different styles and cultural influences?

Obviously when I moved to Dubai in 2013, I had to adapt to a new culture and taste of middle eastern clients. It was challenging but also very enlightening, the richness of the Islamic Art and culture. Also, you must adapt in speed, the work in Dubai is faster than in Spain, this is very energetic as here everything grows very fast, the project too. But the most impressive part of the adaptation is to work with multicultural people.

What are the biggest challenges you face when designing homes in the Middle East?

Speed and versatility. In Dubai the client expects you to surprise, create incredible concepts and realize in very short time. Clients in this part of the world are more open to different concepts, new ideas while in Europe we are more conservative in general.

What design partners are you loyal to?

I have been loyal to Spanish brands I use for long time in tiles and sanitary ware but in furniture and lighting I like Italian, Spanish, British, however, saying that, with the globalization I have favourite brands everywhere.

What is one trend that we will see more of in the next 5 years?

I think in residential as we are working more and more from home clients will increasingly desire a comfortable workspace at home and their houses cosier and more liveable but without losing the design aspect. In the workplace, we will be making the office more fun and less rigid while in hospitality there is a trend in making the hotel rooms feel more like home.

Who is one style icon or interior designer that inspires you?

Many, in my youth I loved Phillipe Stark, now I’m more into Ferris Rafauli and Tom Ford.

Is there any advice you would give to someone planning to enter the interior design industry?

Be creative and challenge yourself to make something new. Avoid copy pasting ideas from Pinterest and use this as inspiration tool only. Pace your ideas, young designers have too many ideas, use them one by one and develop them. This industry also required perseverance and tenacity, and these are skill you must cultivate.

Is there any advice you would give to someone planning to enter the interior design industry?

The only advice we can give is to deeply understand yourself and your taste. If you don’t focus first of all on your own training as designers it will be very difficult to be able to express yourself through creativity. Exactly how we decide the clothes to wear, our style, how we want to be seen by other people, in the same way we must understand how we want to express ourselves in our projects, paying attention to every detail.

The post Interior Designer – Guillermo Blanco appeared first on Guillermo Blanco Interior Designer.

The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live. It is about the realities of what makes for an attractive, civilized, meaningful environment, not about fashion or what’s in or what’s out. This is not an easy job. Be faithful to your own taste, because nothing you really like is ever out of style.

The goal of a designer is to listen, observe, understand, sympathize, empathize, synthesize, and glean insights that enable him or her to make the invisible visible.

Andrew Grove

Form follows function — that has been misunderstood. Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union. Innovation is often the ability to reach into the past and bring back what is good, what is beautiful, what is useful, what is lasting.

The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live. It is about the realities of what makes for an attractive, civilized, meaningful environment, not about fashion or what’s in or what’s out. This is not an easy job.

Be faithful to your own taste, because nothing you really like is ever out of style. I always put in one controversial item. It makes people talk. I am going to make everything around me beautiful—that will be my life. Be faithful to your own taste, because nothing you really like is ever out of style. I always put in one controversial item. It makes people talk. I am going to make everything around me beautiful—that will be my life.

Innovation is often the ability to reach into the past and bring back what is good, what is beautiful, what is useful, what is lasting. A room should never allow the eye to settle in one place. It should smile at you and create fantasy.

The best rooms have something to say about the people who live in them. There are two things that make a room timeless: a sense of history and a piece of the future. I like an interior that defies labeling. I don’t really want someone to walk into a room and know that I did it.

The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live. It is about the realities of what makes for an attractive, civilized, meaningful environment, not about fashion or what’s in or what’s out. This is not an easy job.

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