Reports

Office

OKAMURA activates sitting. HERMAN MILLER empowers employees. SPACE10 and SCHEMATA ARCHITECTS behave responsibly. OFFECCT goes informal. ANDREU WORLD adapts. Discover what’s driving the business of design.

The Hot Seat

OKAMURA updates the Contessa task chair to meet the demands of modern workers.

Words KANAE HASEGAWA

IN JAPAN, a full-time employee spends an average of 68,400 hours at his or her workplace before reaching retirement age. The calculation comes from Jun Nakahara, an associate professor at the University of Tokyo who researches human learning environments. Even though many companies, especially those in Nordic countries, have introduced standing desks and other healthfocused furniture into the office, sitting still occupies a large portion of the employee’s time – a fact that explains why Japanese office-furniture supplier Okamura launched the ergonomic Contessa in 2002 and, owing to the chair’s success, continued to research the art of sitting ever since. Fifteen years have passed, and a new and improved version – Contessa Seconda – has just been released. When we speak with Takuya Takahashi, who represents Okamura’s marketing division, he explains how the reworked chair responds to developments in today’s working environment without losing the iconic image of the original.

What distinguishes Contessa Seconda from regular task chairs? TAKUYA TAKA- HASHI: Unlike most reclining office chairs, Contessa Seconda has a backrest that is adjusted by gripping the lever under the left armrest. The idea is derived from aeroplane and train seats. It’s much easier to grab the armrest than to bend down and reach a lever attached to the leg of the seat. Users don’t want to think about which buttons adjust which of the chair’s various functions, especially not when they’re focusing on other things. We wanted the control of those functions to be simple and intuitive.

We aimed to accommodate various seating scenarios

While developing the new version of Contessa, Okamura’s engineers made the chair’s backrest frame more flexible and easier to adapt to the natural movement of the body.

Taking a cue from the seats in planes and trains, Okamura integrated Contessa Seconda’s adjustment technology into its armrests.

How does the chair adapt to changes in the working landscape? The new model features many elements required for a contemporary task chair. When Contessa was launched in 2002, most of our users were office workers with personally allocated desks and desktop computers. In today’s more flexible workplace, people with smart notebooks sit with their arms closer to the body and use the armrest to support their elbows. Besides the difference in posture, we had to consider their other activities. In today’s workplace, collaboration and interaction are a given. People spend more time in meetings, for example, where they often express their ideas in body gestures – with every movement, the posture changes. In order to accommodate various seating scenarios, we studied the armrest design, among other things, and developed the 4D armrest – adjustable in height, depth, width and angle. It swivels, allowing the user to find the most comfortable resting position for his or her elbow.

What technical challenges did you face? One was how to incorporate several complicated mechanisms within the chair’s narrow armrests. Unlike the previously mentioned aeroplane seat, an office chair doesn’t have a big space for technology, but we can’t have our end users looking all over the place when they want to activate Seconda’s different functions. We used wires to control the backrest tilt and the height-adjustable seat. These wires connect the lever under the armrest with the backrest, which can recline freely or be locked into one of five preset angles.

Another challenge was to spare the body any unnecessary tension. The chair has an ankle-tilt mechanism that enables the user to find the most comfortable reclining position. The seat follows the movement of the thigh, relieving pressure on the back of the thigh. A lot of engineering went into the perfection of these features.

We didn’t want the upgraded mechanics to affect the chair’s overall design, making it voluminous or chunky. It was important to maintain the essence of the original Contessa – an iconic and successful part of our collection.

What type of office setting is suitable for the new chair? Seconda has a light streamlined design that fits into executive offices and traditional conference rooms, as well as into casual settings. Because the frame is thinner than that of the original model, when you lean back the frame follows the natural contours of your body. Streamlined but strong, the chair supports weights up to 130 kg. New colour options for mesh, fabric and frame are complemented by add-ons, such as a headrest or a clothes hanger.

Ultimately, Contessa Seconda’s ambition is to be such an integral part of the active body that users can go about their business without giving the chair and its comfort-directed functions a second thought. ●

okamura.jp

The HQ of Squarespace in New York City seeks to strike a balance between office and hospitality experiences; highlights are a lobby that hosts art installations, a library, a roof terrace and a panorama bar.

The Office Club

HOSPITALITY-INSPIRED concepts deformalize the office.

It’s no accident that the co-working space is often derived from a hospitality original. The growth of entrepreneurial culture is a key factor in this development. A good example is Soho Works, an offshoot of members’ club and hospitality group Soho House in London. As start-ups multiply, so too does the need for workspaces that offer not only Wi-Fi but also a sense of community, allowing micro businesses and solo entrepreneurs to reach out and support one another. Shared workspaces try to combine the comforts of home with the sociable atmosphere of a café or club.

Offices of all kinds are joining in. No longer formal and hierarchical, they’ve learned a thing or two from the hippest hangouts. People need to collaborate and to focus, and offices increasingly cater to these demands by providing social spaces for brainstorming and meetings, as well as private areas for tasks that require concentration. A new generation of workers – young people who take digital life for granted and blur the boundaries between work and life outside the office – is helping to reshape the workspace. Community elements that support innovation and creativity are replacing the old feeling of formality. Mixeduse locations now blend occupational functions with leisure opportunities, further eradicating outdated distinctions. Research shows that well-designed workspaces improve both health and performance. Inherently flexible and adaptable, the transformative office boosts invention and motivation. — JS

Abbey, by Francesco and Stefano Borella for Quadrifoglio, rejects formality through the use of soft, natural forms and a striking palette that enhance office landscapes with a sense of playfulness and spontaneity.

ÉCAL updated Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec’s pod-like Workbays for Vitra with nontraditional elements, adding to the system’s functionality with a workshop, fitness area, bar, garden and rest zone.

Curvy Dune is at home in the creative office. Designed by Front for Offecct, it sets out to be a new seating typology, ideal for informal meetings of up to eight people.

Bent, Not Broken

Strong yet lightweight, JOACHIM FROMENT’s 0.6 Chair involves a new process of wood lamination with carbonfibre reinforcement.

Words TRACEY INGRAM

5 steps are involved in 0.6 Chair’s production: cutting the sheets of carbon fibre, pressing them into the mould, trimming the edges, applying the veneer, and applying the finish

6-15 kg is the weight of a typical wooden chair. Froment’s current prototype weighs less than 3.8 kg

2 materials – carbon fibre for the structure and wood veneer – comprise the product. The latter can be replaced by cork, leather or textile

0.42 cm is the current thickness of the chair – an improvement on the initial measurement of 0.6 cm for which the product is named

325 kg is the amount of weight that the chair can support

9 layers of carbon fibre – along with 2 sheets of wood veneer – make up the design