The all-weather office: Workplace design for a changing climate
As summers get hotter, and winters get colder, the demand for the ‘all-weather office’ rises. Workspaces must provide cooling in summer without making winter unbearable, and vice versa.
In climates with both sweltering summers and wicked winters, how can companies react to one extreme while avoiding the risk of leaving themselves vulnerable to the other, without a bi-annual office refurb?
While most of the potential for protection from extreme weather conditions lies in the infrastructure and architecture of a building, there are some smaller-scale workplace design modifications that companies can make to ensure that their employees benefit from thermal comfort, whatever the weather.
Smaller-scale workplace design decisions can be made to create an all-weather office.
Flexibility
The primary requirement for any all-weather office is flexibility. Whether opting for flexible schedules, agile furniture, or both, a mobile and modular office is key for adaption.
Flexible Schedules
Flexibility in working hours is crucial for any company hoping to stay relevant, modern, and adaptable to the changing seasons. In summer, for example, some workplaces are opting to mimic “Mediterranean” working hours, in which employees start earlier, take an extended break in the hottest part of the day, then return to work later in the afternoon to finish their usual hours. While true Mediterranean shift patterns encourage a ‘siesta’, simply allowing employees to split their days up in this manner avoids the loss of productivity caused by excessive heat.
What would a flexible winter schedule look like? It may be starting later to avoid the danger of an icy rush hour, leaving early to avoid walking home alone in the dark, or simply opting to work from home to avoid all weather-related commuting danger entirely.
Flexible Furniture
The issue of fluctuating weather is another of the many workplace dilemmas that agile furniture provides the ideal solution to.
For the uninitiated, the term ‘agile furniture’ refers to modular, mobile, multi-functional furniture that can be reconfigured to adapt to various needs and tasks. By utilising this furniture in your workspace, you create a space that can react and adapt to anything, anytime – including extreme temperatures.
Mobile tables, chairs, and even multi-functional mobile systems that incorporate media units, storage, and décor, allow employees to take their workspace wherever they need around the office – whether that’s away from a hot window, or closer to a heater or radiator. These products can also function as dividers or zoning apparatus, creating welcome shade or providing insulation against a draught.
Flexible Workspace
The term ‘agile’ can apply to a full workspace, and not just its furniture. An office is agile if it is separated into task-specific zones and workspaces, allowing employees to choose where they work depending on the requirements of their task, or simply depending on how they feel at the time.
The power of an agile workspace extends into temperature control, not only allowing employees to choose where they work depending on thermal comfort, but providing the opportunity to create zones based on temperature. For example, one zone could benefit from air conditioning and other cooling techniques, whereas another zone could benefit from increased insulation and other methods of warming a space. If employees are not bound to their desks in a static location, there is no need for a ‘middle-ground’ that doesn’t match everyone’s desires. Beyond aiding in climate adaptation, this strategy provides a solution to the age-old battle of the thermostat!
Utilising mobile, multi-functional furniture allows you to adapt to any temperature fluctuations throughout the year.
Biophilic Design
Another returning favourite, the list of biophilic design’s benefits seems never-ending. Long before human life, and likely long after, the natural world endures everything a climate can throw its way, and in mimicking nature’s evolutionary strategies we can ensure our offices are endurable, too.
Natural Light Control
Just like the dappled light across a forest floor, the amount of light filtering into the office can be controlled by some well-placed plants. Their leaves provide shade from the heat, yet still allow precious sunlight in throughout winter.
Natural Insulation
Features such as green roofs and walls, which are roofs and walls made of plant life, provide natural insulation by acting as thermal buffers, reducing the impact of fluctuating temperatures.
Natural Thermal Regulation
Natural elements with high “thermal mass”, such as concrete, stone, brick and rock, can be strategically placed around the office to take advantage of their temperature-regulating properties. Materials such as these absorb heat during the day and release it at night, so placing them in direct sunlight in winter and shaded areas in summer will help to counter the temperature discrepancy.
Natural Humidifiers
Water features can naturally influence the humidity of a room, cooling the air via evaporation in summer, and adding moisture to the air of heated indoor spaces in winter. This humidity-moderating potential is shared by many plants, and combining the two natural elements will boost their effectiveness.
Biophilic Design elements, such as living walls and certain minerals, can provide natural thermal control
Innovation
When it comes to workplace furniture, its level of mobility is not the only factor that can contribute to an all-weather office. Innovation in the face of a changing climate continues to birth designs that provide solutions for improved thermal comfort, no matter the season.
Mesh
The use of mesh is not a new concept, but its use in furniture continues to grow alongside demand for temperature control. Mesh allows air to pass through easier than traditional upholstered furniture, boosting air circulation and providing higher levels of thermal comfort. In seating, this material’s airflow prevents uncomfortable heat build-up during prolonged sitting.
While in winter this cooling effect may not be as welcome (unless you find yourself wrapping up too warm), a simple cushion or blanket is enough to offset any unwanted heat loss.
Height-Adjustable Desks
The sit-stand desk rises again as a solution to thermal discomfort. In summer, excessive heat can contribute to a massive fall in productivity, due to heat stress and other factors. Even without heat stress, many of us would admit to having our heads and eyelids droop at our desks when temperatures rise too far! To counter this lethargy, alternating between sitting and standing increases blood flow, boosting brain activity.
On the other hand, in winter, the additional movement a height-adjustable desk allows helps to increase our body temperature, especially if combined with stretching and the occasional walk-around.
Thermo-reactive Material
When it comes to innovation in thermal comfort, Celliant is at the forefront. Material imbued with this infrared-responsive technology, developed by Hologenix, is embedded with thermo-reactive minerals that are reported to provide improved temperature regulation, among a range of other health-boosting benefits.
Considering the materials used within a space, particularly for seating, is crucial when crafting an all-weather office. Even if utilising high-tech solutions like Celliant isn’t realistic or attainable for a company, the choice of material in office furniture and its effect on thermal comfort deserves careful consideration when it comes to adapting to fluctuating climates.
When combined with appropriate risk assessments, company health and safety policies, and health & safety awareness on an individual level, the above strategies can transform the workspace into a refuge from the adverse effects of extreme weather. As temperatures fluctuate, and with rising energy costs as employees attempt to adapt at home, a well-designed and versatile workspace has the potential to ensure employees remain comfortable and efficient, reducing the strain on personal resources and promoting overall morale and wellbeing.
Whether or not extreme temperatures become the norm, in designing an all-weather office a company creates a future-proof one. From agile workspaces to biophilic design, the solutions for climate adaptation possess a myriad of multi-functional benefits beyond thermal regulation, enriching any workspace and ensuring adaptability to anything the future may hold.
How do you retain personal thermal comfort in increasingly extreme temperatures? Share your thoughts, alongside this article, with the hashtag #DamsWeather!