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BÜRO UND VERWALTUNG • OFFICE BUILDINGS THEORIE • THEORY
Fotos: Gordon Koelmel / Nimbus Group
Kommunikation entsteht oft zufällig ... • Communication often occurs ... posal won against those of top-class competitors. This quotation from the magazine “art” under the heading “Eine
... in Bewegungs- und Zwischenräumen! • ... in movement areas!
162 • AIT 10.2016
tems, which mutually control each other. Do we know which one of these systems actually makes the decision for a
given task? No, says Kahneman and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Economics for this. We also do not know which
one of the systems is more suited for a task. Kahneman assigns the characteristics ‘fast’ respectively ‘slow’ to these two
systems and explains them as intuitive respectively rationally controlled. The statements and examples in Kahneman’s
book are of great interest especially if one is to assume that creativity has something to do with decision-making and
thus with quick and slow thinking because decisions are prepared respectively made through these two systems, this
means that something new is created. The new arises from ourselves, from one’s own systems of thought – the intuitive
and rational intelligence. Creativity means “... to actively address the new and the unknown, to be open to learning sit-
uations, to consider issues from ever new points of view and create one’s own learning strategies.” There are four basic
room groups in office planning: 1. the classic workplace, 2. the communication and meeting room, 3. the infrastructure
room, and 4. the zone in-between. Creativity research has shown that spontaneous impulses allowing the unknown
and openness towards the unknown are necessary for creativity and innovation. Creative work in the office - mainly
takes place in the group of zones in-between because this is where spontaneous encounters take place, which we need
as external impulses for creativity and innovation.
The Rolex Learning Center by Sanaa provokes spontaneous encounters
“The person eager for knowledge is here seen as a wanderer, who knows how to make use of the coincidence and
appreciates to get into conversation with members of very different disciplines. This is a building for the requirements
of the Bologna reform”, explains Patrick Aebischer, President of ETH Lausanne, to the journalists who came together to
see the new Rolex Learning Center in Lausanne. “Promoting communication had been a central demand of the compe-
tition”, added Kazuyo Sejima, who together with Ryue Nishizawa jointly runs the Japanese office Sanaa, whose pro-
Bibliothek zum Flanieren“ (A library for strolling) points out how the connections of room, coincidence, encounter, intu-
ition, interdisciplinarity, and innovation were understood and determined by the client and the architectural office for
the construction of the Rolex Learning Center in Lausanne. Hardly any other currently completed building is as a struc-
ture able to demonstrate these relationships so precisely. The one-storey landscape forms circulation areas and inter-
spaces, which seamlessly merge into one another and into meeting areas and communication zones. The missing
demarcation of rooms creates a single mixture of possible encounters, around which an envelope was constructed.
How can spatial design support creative activities?
Learning in the sense of a creative process of creating new knowledge and the exchange for the purpose of innovation
is based on spontaneous encounters. Seen in a causal relationship, this confirms the hypothesis of the relationship
between the zones in-between and the creative impulse: zone in-between – informal, unplanned meeting – intuitive deci-
sion-making – creative impulse. The Rolex Learning Center is a learning venue at a university and not an office building
in the usual sense. Nevertheless, certain phenomena can be transferred from one category to the other, because the initial
question is the same: How can I support creative action through spatial design? In this respect, this building as an interior
provides useful indications of how the creative exchange between employees can be promoted in an office concept.
Movement spaces are the most important places for informal meetings
Our approach is based on the idea of the duality of systems with the focus being on the room in-between these systems.
The movement areas are especially between the different office environments, which consist of workplaces and meet-
ing areas. These movement areas are a fundamental component of any office architecture, besides the infrastructural
rooms such as tea kitchen, printer or server room or storeroom. Especially movement areas are the most important
places for informal meetings, for spontaneous encounters and unplanned meetings. These zones in-between thus sup-
port our intuitive intelligence, our intuition and should therefore rise in the awareness of planners, clients and compa-
nies. In these in-between zones we need the chaotic environment as counterpart to tidy offices and meeting rooms,
where not everything is organised and where things can happen coincidentally: staircase, corridor, anteroom of WCs,
lobbies in front of meeting rooms, at the reception desk, between project groups, on the way to the kitchen, in the smok-
ers’ corner, in front of the lift, inside the lift, in the vestibule, in the library. These in-between zones should be designed
as places that are able to temporarily accommodate chance encounters of employees. Furnishing, surfaces and light
have to be adapted according to the special requirements of the in-between zones so that they can be discovered and
explored as new functional locations. That way the conditions required for creativity in the office can be created - if
one derives these requirements from the findings of creativity research. The conscious dealing with collisions and the
places for them makes it possible to leave the realm of speculation about creative work in the design of office environ-
ments and rely on well-founded findings instead. Because how can we otherwise tell whether the desired effect of an
office environment will actually be effective once it is implemented. According to Ben Waber and his colleagues, only
very few companies give profound thought to whether the design of their offices promotes or rather hampers the per-
formance of their staff – although they have all possibilities to do so.
1 Workspaces That Move People • Ben Waber, Jennifer Magnolfi, und Greg Lindsay • Harvard Business Review • 1. Oktober 2014, 139–51
2 Schnelles Denken, langsames Denken • Daniel Kahneman • München: Siedler • 2012
3 Kluges Lernen: sieben Kapitel über kreatives Denken und Handeln • Ellen J Langer • Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt-Taschenbuch-Verlag. • 2001
4 Rolex Learning Center - Sanaa: Eine Bibliothek zum Flanieren • Zeitschrift art • April 2016