UK HYDROGRAPHIC OFFICE, TAUNTON
timescale – completing exactly three years since initial work began in January 2016. The speedy build process was enabled in large part by BAM, who achieved this by splitting the project into two phases, which allowed the car park construction required by the UKHO to be undertaken while the design and costing were completed for the headquarters building itself.
Agile workspaces
The building is in the main constructed as a system of two large interconnected floorplates, which bend gently in a controlled geometry in constant motion. These two floorplates are connected on the ground floor by a dramatic 800 m2 atrium. The fluid motion of the floorplates is continued in this space, with timber panels running along the twisted linear design. Looking upwards from the ground floor here, users see curving timber elements, adding to the sense of fluidity, ample daylighting coming between them from rooflights covering the atrium roof. Connecting both sides physically and visually on the first floor are open balconies and bridges. The central atrium’s large staircases lead users up to these levels, which provide access to the two symmetrically placed wings.
The occupants are encouraged to engage with this atrium as they move around the building, with provisions created for stimulating and creative encounters between colleagues. To facilitate this, there is a gradient of activity types with breakout and social spaces within the atrium, including collaborative and agile workspaces around the balcony edges on the first floor, and individual desking towards the perimeter.
Arranged around the atrium on both sides are the rest of the building’s various amenities, including 700 desks across flexible work spaces, broken down into 10 smaller neighbourhoods with a range of work settings, including team tables, ‘scrum’ areas (as part of the agile working concept), height adjustable desks and quiet work zones.
These wide open working environments were a vital step in meeting the client’s brief, creating the feeling that workers are all as part of the same space, able to interact and co-work with each other to make up a workforce that is more energised and synchronised to achieve their daily tasks – with acoustic and lighting barriers allowing for more private spaces where necessary.
ADF AUGUST 2019
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This brief was intended by the agency to promote a cultural shift within the UKHO itself, prioritising the wellbeing and functionality of the 850 members off staff working in the building. As such, it required a building which cultivates this kind of collaboration, and provides a modern way of working with the ability to accommodate future business needs – and the design and engineering behind the new building allowed this to be achieved both subtly and efficiently.
CURVING BAFFLES
The ceiling of the atrium includes curving larch baffles to enhance the feeling of fluidity and contribute to acoustic control
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