“Join over 3,500 attendees and 120 speakers at the Business Design Centre in London on 27-28 February 2024. Explore the latest products, trends, and insights in workplace design, strategy and culture at the Workspace Design Show”.
Well, why not, I thought?
So, I did.
Here is my story of a safari among the stands.
The quote at the start is the extract that appears when searching for the event leading to the show link itself. The page it leads to now time-travels forwards to 2025’s event, “Bloom: Exploring the thriving ecosystem of work life – 26 – 27 February 2025”. Yes, you can register to attend next year already, and clearly there is a theme already. Ecosystem, eh? Intriguing.
That makes me think ‘green’, and I rather hope there are fewer plastic plants on show than this year, though credit goes to Plant Designs, the company whose representative at least referred to fake plants as ‘a last resort’ for locations where natural plants would struggle. The other seemed to be gung-ho about plastic, and so doesn’t get a mention.
The thing is, though, that workspace isn’t about anything struggling, least of all human users. Quite the reverse. It is about facilitating, about getting the very best out of the humans using the space. The best work, the best attitude, the best response. Frankly, the result at any one time can be a peculiar collision of utility, research, and fashion. I was involved when the Home Office built and fitted out its then new headquarters in Marsham Street in Westminster. The move towards unisex washrooms was upon us, the popular colours of the day were greys (even more so now), and almost-but-not-quite garish green, orange, red and blue. This, like the brown hues of the bridge of the Next Generation era Starship Enterprise from Star Trek, will have aged by now. So, I was excited to see the latest fashions in workspace (that might be as welcome as an aubergine bathroom suite is now by 2044).
There were immediate surprises and novelties, some mainly novelties to me, having been away from future of work events like WORKTECH for some time. One certainly, then, was a celebration of the cellular office, that former standard, courtesy of Staverton and their launch of ‘Staverton X’. But it made sense. While the boss is away, the mice may not play, but why shouldn’t they use his valuable workspace?
Having recently done some work with coworking space owner Paul Andrews (also co-host of the downright funny Business Bunker show) celebrating his stunning recently opened coworking space in Sheerness, Islandworks, and looked around his Fruitworks in Canterbury, and with Tenterden’s The Trading Post on the agenda, I am deeply interested in flexible and hybrid working, especially as I do a lot of it myself in various locations including Newman Flexible Workspace in Bromley. Coworking space is a godsend to the SME and startup, but it has to be good, and if you have the right gear, it gets better.
I was therefore happy to see some of the ‘right gear’ for coworking and other use of space in the form of Hotbox’s offerings. I’m not closely acquainted with them yet, but I loved their containers. As their website says, “Hybrid working made easy – Store, carry and organise everything you need for your working day with Hotbox essential workspace accessories and luggage.” You see, we business folk (as a former Civil Servant the term amuses me for some reason!) need a lot of things to function at our best, and we don’t get them enough of the time. How about:
- Money – well, money paid on time, at least. That resonate with anyone? It does with Small Business Commissioner Liz Barclay, who has a campaign on the issue.
- Time – Quality time, time for our flow states to kick in, not our flow states to be kicked in by distractions, which happens all too often.
- Health – Linak’s ‘sit-stand desks’, accompanied by leaflets explaining their health benefits, and the page ‘How to get motivated to stand up’. I know a couple of products that would be good for that: read on to the end off this post to see what I mean. Alternatively, do arm crunches while holding for Fora Form’s chunky brochure, the heaviest and the heaviest paper of any I encountered there, from ‘one of Scandinavia’s largest furniture manufacturers’, who were pleasingly also handing out wine and other refreshments as I left.
- Space – yes, maybe this is the final frontier (we’re back at Star Trek again). There is a bedroom economy, and bedrooms simply aren’t suited to be optimal workspace. Studies in homes and garden offices (£60,000 for a good one, if you have the space, or a garden at all) can still be invaded by family, friends, and pets. Just see what Maria Wilson of Saxon HR has to say about just how much better coworking is than that pickle. But what if the optimal (coworking spaces) can be made more optimal? Of if sub-optimal (bedrooms, studies, café’s and other interruptible locations) can be uplifted?
At least, on this latter point, the caddies and satchels (aka, ‘the Shuttle’) of Hotbox provide a physical ‘office in a box’ solution, and an ability for those, like me, who don’t like clear desk policies, to carry their personality with them and pack and unpack their beloved stationary, IT, fluffy toys and lucky rulers as needed. Yes, I did enjoy their stand and thinking how simple things can make such a difference. Doubly so as – and I am sure this is a common occurrence – decent space standards in the Brave New Home Office building were reduced rapidly, creating worse space, meaning that Hotboxes (if used) are a way to hang on to your dignity and identity as your world shrinks around you.
Also rather mobile were the castor-bottomed walls and shelves of ThinkingWall. Back in Marsham Street, I remember a then innovative feature, the ‘Street’, a common passageway with breakout spaces stretching across three buildings. Now, I can imagine the fun we might have had racing walls up and down the Street, at least until photographed and exposed in the Daily Mail.
Perhaps I should add Safety to the above bullet points. If so it was reassuring that there was no need for the emergency lighting being shown by Daisalux, as there were no emergencies to be illuminated.
What really strikes me is how little, for all the existence of organisations such as the Federation Of Small Business, Enterprise Nation, services like Start Up Bromley and others, and a ton of business coaches, marketing experts, social media consultants, and others, so little of the goodies showcased at the Workspace Design Show come to the everyday notice of startup and small and medium businesses.
Unless they go to events like this one. Or read this blog post.
Even for me, as a PR, it was only in November 2023 at The Business Show that I encountered the highly impressive magazine The Homeworker, and I met people from another, Startups magazine (which I have known a lot longer and written for).
Finally, a word of praise to Smarter Surfaces, an Irish ‘whiteboard, magnetic and projection surfaces’ company. They had the only stand at any networking event I can remember with tots of Bushmills Whiskey for passers-by. It is a wonder that I didn’t pass by repeatedly, but it was just the once. Honest.
Perhaps I should have suggested they combine with ‘coffee solutions’ provider, Liquidline, ‘The UK and Ireland’s fastest-growing provider of refreshment solutions for commercial fit-outs.
Mmm, Irish coffee.
Darren Weale, 2 April 2024
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