A new office and furniture for Help Musicians Glasgow
“Good things come in small packages”
You don’t need to be doing a major refurbishment when you come to Amos Beech for advice. This was demonstrated earlier this year when Help Musicians UK approached us to provide interior design ideas and costs to refurbish a small office as they had taken on an office lease in Glasgow.
A new office with new office furniture for Help Musicians at the Briggait in Glasgow
The Briggait, in Glasgow’s Merchant City was built in 1873 and was once the city’s fish market. It now houses creative and cultural organisations including workspaces for artists, so the choice of location for the leading UK charity for musicians, seemed perfect.
The size of the unit was only 387.5 sq ft but the charity had a need to create an environment that offered desk space for their Scottish staff, as well as a hot desking area for visiting staff and a small breakout area. Importantly, the office area had to reflect the branding of HMUK, in particular their logo and colour scheme.
The interior design team here at Amos Beech worked closely with HMUK’s London based Operations Officer and produced interior design schemes which included furniture layouts and colour suggestions for flooring and fabrics which kept in line with the brand guidelines. Also taken in to consideration was the need for AV facilities to allow for video conferencing.
The building itself being over 100 years old comes with high ceilings and beautiful tall windows. However, this feature challenged us in terms of acoustics and so we suggested ceiling hung acoustic panels again in the strong brand colours, which helps in some way to absorb sound.
What has been created is small and concise but really packs a punch and the just demonstrates that no matter how big or small your project is, the team here at Amos Beech can deliver.
Interior design, office refurbishment and fit out Glasgow
Over the last 10 years we have been a frequent visitor to Morisons Solicitors in Glasgow (now Blackadders) as we have been on hand to help them with internal office alterations, the inevitable ‘lost keys’ and various other needs since we helped them move to Bothwell Street in 2007.
Blackadders that can trace its roots back to 1773, has an eye for quality and detail and it hadn’t gone unnoticed that the office was looking a little tired.
Interior design, office refurbishment and fit out Glasgow
As you would expect, Blackadders looked at all the options, considered other office locations in Glasgow but ultimately decided to stay and refurbish – a big factor was the number of car parking spaces they have under the building!
So a potential move became a stay and refurbish and fit out along with the associated challenge of keeping a busy team of lawyers functioning in the meantime.
Our Project Team rolled up their sleeves and got down to work. Intelligent interior design was crucial to the success of the project as well as ensuring the final result was every bit as impressive.
The project was carefully designed around three phases which as requested, allowed the business to continue to function. For a couple of weeks, all client meetings were held off site but this was a small inconvenience to worry about.
In the first stage, we emptied the top floor and refurbished it to create a new staff breakout area that offered an oasis of peace and quiet that was attractive to staff. The new space encourages them to leave their desks and office environment for something more uplifting and homely.
The next piece of the puzzle was to move the main office into the meeting suite to allow the necessary upgrades to the air conditioning, data cabling, electrics, lighting as well as redecoration, new storagewall and office furniture upgrades.
Through careful observation and analysis of the way Blackadders work, the interior design team were able to identify some new ways of working that would benefit the team. By introducing quiet work zones, collaboration areas and a new tea point with a Zip instant hot water tap, flexible space and agile working are very much on the agenda.
The budget was not a free for all and so careful management and intelligent re-use of existing desks and supplementing with new from the same range which was still available. Continuity is very important when selecting office furniture ranges for this reason alone. Doing all of this we were able to increase occupancy on the same floor space whilst at the same time liberating space that had previously been lost in storage capacity which was no longer required.
The interior design team were keen to make the space as invigorating as possible and by using the storagewall as their canvas, a vinyl wrap was used to bring the great big outdoors to a lawyers office in the middle of Glasgow. Inspirational stuff indeed.
Completing the project was perhaps the most important part which is the ‘front of house’. Morisons window on Glasgow is the space to which both private and commercial clients are invited and it was crucial that this space presented the correct image.
Again, keeping an eye on the overall budget, we were able to re-use the existing reception desk and chairs. To complement, a new sofa was selected from Lyndon Design and complete redecoration of the space.
