Office refurbishment in Farringdon

Transforming a tired ninth floor into a workspace that supports how people actually work now

From Monotone to Meaningful
The ninth floor of this Farringdon office building had become tired and dysfunctional. Sixty-five desks arranged in monotonous rows. Hard surfaces throughout. No variation in work settings. Meeting rooms oversized and underused. The existing office suffered from a familiar problem. Everything matched. White desks, white walls, metal finishes, hard floors. The consistency created visual flatness and the reflective surfaces amplified noise across the entire floor plate.

We introduced warmth through natural materials. Plywood desk units. Laminated timber work surfaces. Acoustic curtains in rich ochre tones. The metal raised floor tiles remained exposed, but the palette shifted toward calm.

Collaborative Zones
A central forum space replaced an awkward storage area and underused circulation route. Large communal tables seat twenty-four for whole-team meetings, project reviews, or individual focused work. The tables connect to floor boxes below, keeping cables contained and the workspace flexible. A breakfast bar runs along the edge of this zone, arranged around a wall-mounted screen for informal presentations and CPD sessions.

Acoustic Strategy
The original layout had no meaningful acoustic separation. Card screens added over time created visual clutter without solving the underlying noise problem. We installed shaped acoustic baffles in the corridor zone to isolate the communal space from the desk areas. Acoustic panels were added to the backs of existing desks. A large billowing felt curtain can be drawn to further separate the forum space when needed.

Natural acoustic materials, wood wool panels in warm tones, appear throughout, reducing reverberation whilst adding visual texture.

Private Spaces for Hybrid Working
Two dedicated zoom pods occupy the space near the entrance. Each includes a laminated plywood desk, comfortable bucket-style seating, dimmable globe lighting, and acoustic wall treatments. Clean backgrounds for video calls and no distractions.

Standing and touchdown desks sit between the pods and the main workspace. A mid-height dividing wall formed from a cube shelving system separates these positions from the forum space while maintaining visual connection.

Reception and Arrival
The entrance sequence was poor. Visitors arrived directly into the desk area with nowhere to wait. No sense of threshold. A dedicated reception zone now occupies the space immediately inside the entrance. A feature bench provides seating for waiting clients and consultants. Low-level cube storage systems define the perimeter, their white frames filled with timber panels, books, and planting to soften the boundary.

Right-Sized Meeting Rooms
The original conference room could seat twenty, but rarely did. Most meetings involved three or four people. The furniture dominated the space. We reconfigured the meeting accommodation to better match actual use. A flexible room accommodates both large presentations and smaller gatherings. A separate three-person meeting room handles the daily conversations that don't need a boardroom.

Interested in workspace refurbishment?
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