Commercial Office Fit-out | Velocity Village | Sheffield
SIX AD provides consultancy services on statutory issues, as well as architectural and interior design services for a multi-disciplinary practice in Sheffield.
Brief
In November 2009, SIX AD was approached by the Sheffield branch of a major multi-disciplinary practice, with a view to securing architecture + design services for their proposed relocation to a new office in Sheffield City Centre. The Client proposed to take one and a half floors of the new Velocity Village, which is a mixed use building complex.
Preliminary floor layouts had already been produced by Helen Winfield at HWDesign; SIX AD were appointed to progress the plans to a completed state, provide design and consultation services to the Client and provide technical support to HWDesign, who would be embedded within SIX AD until completion of the project.
Challenges + Opportunities
The Velocity Village complex was at an advanced stage in the overall build programme, however at the beginning of the fit-out project for our Client, the Velocity buildings were incomplete. SIX AD provided schedules to describe the extent of the CAT A / CAT B fit-out, which were in turn used within the tenancy agreement.
The Client requested that SIX AD undertake a detailed compliance survey of the pre-completion building shell, in order to determine building elements that required further work in order to secure Building Regulations approval and any risks relating to discharge of Planning Conditions; specific care was taken to note where outstanding works would have a direct and potentially detrimental impact on the tenancy of our Client and on our Client’s visitors.
The drawings provided by the CAT A architect did not accurately reflect the as-built condition; this made it extremely difficult to provide accurate layouts for the setting-out of partitions and furniture for our Client’s Main Contractor and their sub-contractors. We updated the base-plans to reflect the as-built dimensions and in turn this meant that our correct and updated drawings did not match the layouts of the other floors. This problem affected the calculation of occupied floor areas for the tenancy agreement, however this was resolved through negotiation.
As well as specifying new furniture, the project involved the phased relocation of most of the Clients existing office furniture to the new location. SIX AD worked with HWDesign and the Client to catalogue the existing furniture and produce accurate proposed layouts, incorporating individual items of furniture; this ensured that all items fit perfectly as they were moved in to place.
Design
SIX AD were appointed to assist in a mainly technical and consulting capacity, however we were able to present proposals to the Client that a number of opportunities existed to demonstrate the company’s forward looking ethos and in turn refresh the Client's brand.
As well as providing furniture layouts for the project, SIX AD liaised with the design team to provide co-ordinated ceiling and floor layouts, partition layouts, glazed screen details, schedules of new furniture and colour schemes.
In addition to providing kitchen, meeting room, conference / board room design schemes, SIX AD produced designs for the new reception area, located in the heart of the Level 3, adjacent to the building core. The reception area required the creation of a new doorway, works to the ceiling to accommodate the steps in level between the reception and main office, in addition to the design of a bespoke illuminated back-panel and reception desk.
The original concept of the reception desk was developed with HWDesign and included a monolithic rectangular form, with an illuminated front panel. The reception desk was modelled in 3D by SIX AD, using Autodesk Revit to produce visualisations, working drawings and to refine the design to include the provisions that the desk needed to allow it to operate in a busy reception environment.
The final reception desk design included a pop-up LCD monitor cover and slide out keyboard tray, door release button and LCD illuminated front and side panels; the desk was specified as being finished in White Corian and was fabricated and installed by Interior Surfaces Ltd of Hillsborough.
Services
SIX AD were appointed to fulfill the duties agreed in our bespoke appointment document, which were to :-
- Produce GA Floor Layouts for Lease Agreement
- Produce detailed GA setting out drawings, including setting out of partitions, fixtures and fittings
- Conceptual and detailed design of the reception desk and reception area
- Produce finish material sample boards and finishes schedule
- Produce proposals for the integration and extension of corporate branding throughout the new office space
- Produce kitchen / kitchenette layouts
- Produce board room and conference room design schemes
- Produce / amend specification in line with existing building spec standards
- Produce typical partition / screen / door details
- Produce co-ordinated ceiling layouts
- Produce co-ordinated floor layouts
- Co-ordinate production of externally visible signage
- Liaise with estates management over the production / configuration of way-finding signage
- Liaise with relevant third parties regarding statutory approvals for the detailed design
Conclusions
The reception area in particular has been very well received by the Sheffield based staff, as well as the Board members that attended the opening ceremony. The property owner was also impressed with the overall aesthetic and invited SIX AD to look at the feasibility of refreshing the reception areas of other properties in their portfolio.
