Project of the Week: Welcome to Skyberia
How do you create a workplace to enable people to do the best work of their careers in a big timber shed? We unpacked the lessons learnt from the 45,000 sqm Sky Central London at The Property Congress.
Sky Central London brings together a 3,0-strong workforce under one roof nearHeathrow airport. The multi-award-winning building features 18 different ‘neighbourhoods’ – each able to accommodate around 200 people – and 15 different work settings. There are 2,0 desks and 5,000 places to sit, as well as an eye-watering 25,000 plants.
Dealing with the size and scale of the project – 170 metres long and 100 metres wide – was a tremendous challenge, HASSELL principal Kirsti Simpson told the Darwin audience during a standout session on ‘world’s best projects’.
“We realised conventional workspaces wouldn’t cut it,” Simpson said.
How did HASSELL make comfortable and intimate spaces in what was effectively a big barn?
By “breaking the volume down into neighbourhoods with soft borders”, Simpson explained. “Vertical obstacles at regular intervals”make the space feel “more comfortable and human”.
Simpson says her team “outlawed kidult furniture”, as well as chrome, aluminium and grey to create “something human in what is essentially a vast shed”.
“While collaboration is critical, concentration can’t be overlooked. Recognise that there needed to be places for quiet and concentrated work,” Simpson advised.
The seven plants per person also fosters a feeling of a calm home-away-from home. This residential feel was “intentional”, Simpson said, adding that HASSELL is “interested in creating spaces that have the desirable hospitality feel”.
The building was Sky’s first foray into an agile working environment and needed to be appealing to lure workers out to ‘Skyberia’, as it is often called by employees. HASSELL “interrogated” the Sky brand to understand how people needed to work.
“We were constantly extracting, interrogating and interpreting data.”
Amenities on offer include six restaurants and cafés, a 200-seat cinema, a swimming pool and nearly 25,000 plants. There’s even a nailbar and the ‘Skystreet’ for pop up shops.
Simpson had several key takeaways for the crowd – but the biggest was “make the change journey easy”.
HASSELL created a “live lab or prototype space so staff could experience all the work settings. This gave people a real sense of familiarity and comfort.”