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look. And what about Bruno Rey? He was very pleased that his original design idea had been picked up and pursued. Nevertheless the new design is autonomous and not simply a re-design of the original. Author: Katharina Feuer After graduating in interior design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich in 2010, Alexander Rehn (born 1983) worked for the Greutmann Bolzern design studio in Zurich. In 2012, he founded his own studio. Until August 2015, Rehn worked as an assistant professor for product design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich.
English translation from page 56
Complex Office Spaces md correspondent Jamy Yang reports from Shanghai
Recently a photo shoot took place in our Shanghai design studio. The brief came from an American office-furniture manufacturer. They imagined an office bursting at the seams with busily working menials behind room dividers. Just as you might imagine a typical Chinese office seen from the standpoint of foreign observers. Far from it! The offices of our creative minds have for quite some time now looked completely different. Change set in about ten years ago. In parallel with the growth of the Chinese agency scene, the requirements concerning the workplace design there changed as well. Research by the furniture manufacturers suggested that a productive office for Generation Y should provide differentiated spaces – i.e. individual workplaces, rooms for teamwork and co-working, a larger meeting and conference area, plus jointly used spaces, including a kitchen: spatial variety that mirrors different working and communication requirements.
The office of the international Flamingo Factsheet brand agency, designed by Neri & Hu for Office: Flamingo Shanghai Office the Shanghai location, is an interesting Location: 7th Floor, Building 11, example. When you step into it, you get an 207 Mengzi Road, Huangpu, impression of openness right from the beShanghai, China, 200231 ginning. The clear separation of private and www.flamingoshanghai.com public spaces is easily visible. Individual Architects: Lyndon Neri, Rossana Hu, workplaces are shielded by unobtrusive Neri & Hu Design and hip-high concrete room dividers; they look Research Office extremely attractive with their black Associate in Charge: Nellie Yang wooden surfaces and black industrial Design team: Begoña Sebastian, lamps. The kitchen, too, is a popular space Anqing Zhu, Kelvin Huang, Brian Lo, for the staff. A communicative place for Zhao Yun, Litien Poeng talks among colleagues, even if laptops Project manager: Jerry Guo are always part and parcel of the lunch Area: 620 m² break. An open space is reserved for work- Completion: 2014 shops and public events like movie nights or art exhibitions for invited guests. In Our author Jamy Yang contrast to this you feel as if you are in a studied product design in chapel when you enter the white office of China and graduated in the management, which may be due to Germany with a master’s the pitched roof and the double room degree in industrial design. height. The room where visitors are welHe worked at Siemens HQ for a while comed is also an exceptional one. They sit before returning to China and founding behind a one-way mirror and are able to Yang Design in Shanghai in 2005, an observe the goings-on in the agency as if office for product strategies and design they were in a theatre box. consultancy. In 2007, the y-town design label was established, catering for environObservers are observed mental problems, human resources, In any case, all staff members perceive material studies and design experiments. what is going on around them, because Among his qualifications are numerous the architects play with varying glass surnational and international design awards. faces – transparent, semi-transparent and frosted ones, plus with spy glass, mirrored on one side, reserved for the rooms intendEnglish translation from page 58 ed for research work by focus groups. A rock-solid busines Carefully planned apertures and layered materials transform each of the enclosures Is author design an obsolete model? into a filter – at Flamingo Shanghai an observer may turn into someone observed and vice versa, at any time. The office is located in a former industrial building with a flat roof. The conversion is ingenious in two respects. On the one hand, a kind of pitched roof was created by means of an A-frame steel structure. On the other, architects Lyndon Neri and Designers as pop stars and extravagant Rossana Hu broke with the traditional designs – long live the spectacle! concept of an attic by implementing spamd author Jörg Zimmermann is of the tial landscapes – floors in varying heights, opinion that backstage co-operation houses in a house, rooms in a room. To between manufacturers and designers is outsiders this may sound complicated, but less than glamorous. the staff enjoy navigating between the various areas. Staff members confirmed Let’s be honest about it: if during the this by saying that “the fluent transitions Cologne furniture fair the legendary busy contribute to a relaxed atmosphere”. little gnomes of Cologne, the HeinzelAuthor: Jamy Young männchen, were to spring into action once
md | 6.2015