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Net Working

The American "culture of connectivity" crosses the pond to Cisco Systems in suburban London

Craig Kellogg -- Interior Design, 11/1/2004 12:00:00 AM

Cisco Systems employees in London have desktops on their laptop screens—and nowhere else. In the age of the Internet, who needs permanently assigned workstations? The company's itinerant staff spends only a few days at a time in the office, and salespeople even digitize their family photos to display on-screen. "Cisco has a clean-desk policy," explains Aileen Asher, vice president and head of European interiors at Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum in London.

Asher's team had completed schemes for Cisco in Paris and Brussels before designing this 250,000-square-foot headquarters for the company's U.K. sales and marketing staff. Located at Bedfont Lakes, a high-tech complex conveniently close to Heathrow Airport, the offices occupy three mid-rise spec buildings, each with a central atrium; they're set in a leafy park that was once a brownfield.

Employees shuttling in for several days find facilities that are rigorously organized and meticulously maintained. (The building managers have hotel experience.) But efficiency and comfort are only part of the story. As an international leader in computer hardware, software, and services, Cisco obviously valued connectivity. "The whole building is wireless," Asher notes. "It was a test-bed for technology."

Virtual Desk Technology functions everywhere, allowing employees to route calls to ring at the nearest of many Internet-protocol telephones. In a conference room, Smart Boards combine a dry-erase surface with digital projection, so the musings accumulated over the course of a meeting can be printed out afterward. A waiting area offers Barcelona chairs alongside bar-height "touchdown" consoles for e-mail checking and Web surfing.

Starting here, an interior promenade known as the Cisco Story is designed to impress potential clients as it circles around a product-exhibition space. The path's perimeter is lined by glass graphic panels, a 16-screen media wall, and interactive "totems," all reinforcing the marketing message. Display fixtures of glass and maple allow demonstrations for groups.

The Cisco Story promenade and the spaces off it—a flexible conference suite as well as four demonstration labs—are collectively known as the executive briefing center. This cluster of spaces is located to the left of main reception. Behind reception is a grouping known as the technical briefing center, its waiting area a-swivel with a flock of Swan chairs by Arne Jacobsen. Associate designer Tim Eavis, one of the project's two lead designers, describes the overall layout as "like a web" of spaces, both networked and networking.

Some employees settle at conventional open-plan workstations on the three buildings' upper floors. Other staffers, perching on Stefano Giovannoni's swoopy bar stools, plug into the power and data ports embedded in the three-sided red-lacquered tops of custom tables, adapted from the Cisco fit-out in Brussels.

Because these tables also repeat on all office floors at Bedfont Lakes—as do the stools and workstations—elevator lobbies employ several strategies to keep employees oriented. The floor-to-ceiling enameled steel tubes that make up dividers are actually interactive information stations, integrating a keyboard and a flat screen that displays digitized floor plans. Walls painted pink, turquoise, or mauve furthermore display identifying graphics and shapes since, as Eavis notes, "Men seem to be more color-blind than ladies."

Mounted in rows and backlit, these spun-steel shapes include crosses, triangles, and squares. The convex circular ones could just possibly be overstock from a Chinese-restaurant supplier, but associate designer Simon Bone— the other lead designer on the project—quickly corrects any misimpression about the metal emblems: They're a lot more substantial than woks.

Previous spread: At Cisco Systems in the London suburbs, Web-connected touchdown consoles and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe chairs flank doors to the executive briefing center's waiting area.

Opposite top: Subtle modifications to the original spec interiors include recessed lighting in executive reception's floor and ceiling. Opposite bottom: Interactive displays bring the executive briefing center's Cisco Story to life.

Top: Enameled-steel tubes screen an elevator lobby. Center: Backlit spun-steel disks line up on an elevator lobby's color-coded wall. Bottom: All three buildings have a ground-floor café.

Opposite: Overlooking each building's atrium, custom tables with lacquered tops and cherrywood bases offer power and data connections.

Top: In the main reception area, which handles traffic to all three buildings, the desk of maple and backlit acid-etched glass intentionally echoes the forms and materials palette of the base building. Bottom: Arne Jacobsen's Swan chairs swivel in the technical briefing center's waiting area.

Top: The top-story cafeteria's flooring combines vinyl and ceramic tile. Center: In one of the "gateway zones," near elevators on office floors, Stefano Giovannoni's Bombo stools surround a custom table. Bottom: Jorge Pensi designed the Gorka plywood chairs in the demonstration lab.

PROJECT MANAGER: IAN KILSHAW. PROJECT TEAM: JENNIFER FLEMMING; HELEN WEATHERS; JASMINA MISTRY. CHAIRS, TABLES (EXECUTIVE WAITING AREA): KNOLL. TOUCHDOWN CONSOLES: MABEG THROUGH ERGONOM. FLOORING (EXECUTIVE RECEPTION, BRIEFING CENTER): KINGSPAN GROUP. CHAIRS (EXECUTIVE BRIEFING CENTER): INNO. CEILING PANELS: DECOUSTICS. RECESSED CEILING, FLOOR FIXTURES (EXECUTIVE RECEPTION, BRIEFING CENTER, GATEWAY ZONE, LAB): MODULAR LIGHTING. STOOLS (OFFICE AREAS, CAF): MAGIS. CHAIRS (CAF, CAFETERIA): PIRA. TABLES: SEGIS. CUSTOM SIGNAGE (MAIN RECEPTION): MODULEX. CHAIRS (TECHNICAL WAITING AREA): FRITZ HANSEN. FLOORING (CAFETERIA): SWEDECOR (CERAMIC); FREUDENBERG BUILDING SYSTEMS (VINYL). CHAIRS (LAB): AKABA. GLASS PARTITIONS: OPTIMA. CEILING SYSTEM: SAS INTERNATIONAL. CARPET: INTERFACE CORPORATION. CUSTOM GRAPHICS, SIGNAGE: SAATCHI SAATCHI X; ENDPOINT (FABRICATION). MILLWORK: SPLINTER GROUP. CONSULTANTS: INTERNATIONAL NETWORK SERVICES (DATA, TELECOM); ELECTROSONIC (AUDIOVISUAL); TASC SECURITY (SECURITY). STRUCTURAL ENGINEER, MEP: CAPITA. BUILDING ARCHITECT: AUKETT. GENERAL CONTRACTOR: BOVIS LEND LEASE.