We need to recalibrate offices to make them attractive to today’s working mindset. That means offices need to work harder to be part of sustainable places both socially and economically.
How can we recalibrate offices to make them attractive to today’s working mindset?
In our Making Place report, we look at how to embrace new ways of working alongside a renewed relationship with the office and the local neighbourhood. As we see our working lives being transformed through technology, we have reached a point at which we need to reflect on what this means for the future of physical offices and the communities surrounding them.

Making Place
The report examines what we as employees are looking for from our workplaces, and what that teaches us about how we can narrow the gap between the physical make-up of the places in which we live and which we work. We have identified five different spatial typologies that can help guide us into ensuring offices maintain their important economic and social functions while at the same time contributing to making our cities more enriching and sustainable.
Five spatial typologies
Real world examples

1. Watering holes
Alley Oop is an urban space in downtown Vancouver that invites the public to play in a laneway between commercial buildings.

2. Street classrooms
The steps in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York attract all kinds of citizens to linger at the entrance of this knowledge institution, merging people’s experiences of the exhibitions with their experiences of public life.

3. Cultural canvases
IPUT’s high profile Tropical Fruit Warehouse currently under construction in Dublin city centre is being used as a canvas to showcase work by emerging Irish artists.

4. Mind labs
Arup’s Melbourne office includes a Sky Park with public access where employees and citizens alike can take outdoor meetings in any of the space’s diverse seating areas.

5. Mind gardens
IPUT commissioned award-winning landscape architect Robert Townshend to create an urban park as part of its Earlsfort Terrace redevelopment in Dublin’s central business district.
Léan Doody
We now recognise that workplaces offer unique experiences that are not available when working from home. Those experiences include social and cultural fulfilment as well as opportunities for learning and collaboration.
Making it work
The role of the employer
The employer is the daily enabler, custodian, and manager of workplaces and workplace culture. The company should engage with workplacemaking to support a variety of interactions between colleagues that ultimately lead to greater employee satisfaction, wellbeing, and productivity.
The role of the city
The city is the ultimate legislator, regulator, and facilitator of quality workplacemaking. The city should engage with workplacemaking to bring the productivity and enjoyment of citizens closer together, to create an overall more resilient and liveable urban model.
The role of the developer and landlord
The developer is the initial creator, builder, and maker of places for working and living. The developer should engage with workplacemaking as a way to future-proof real estate projects against short-term market fluctuations.
The rise of the white collar worker

Looking forward
The success of our cities is likely to be impacted by how well these places succeed in bringing people together to share ideas, skills, and experiences that can lead to new, better outcomes.
