Baker McKenzie, Barangaroo, Sydney
Global law firm Baker McKenzie’s hybrid office sets a new benchmark for legal workplace design with its open and collaborative floorplan within Barangaroo’s International Tower 1.
Lawyers can choose from a variety of work environments to suit them and their teams, whilst meeting spaces and breakout hubs across the three floors are accessed via stairs, with guests and clients encouraged to use all levels.
Élan was tasked with crafting custom tables, communal seating, desks and workstations befitting the flexible office ethos. Its ribbed Maple benches with solid timber plugs and butter-soft leather cushioning float in lounge areas with hand-turned solid American Walnut tulip-style tables. This honouring of traditional woodworking crafts is also demonstrated in finishes of the elongated American Oak benches throughout the office with their mortise and tenon, plus dovetail finger joints.
Within communal spaces, rectangular and semicircle Rock Maple tabletops crown powder-coated steel bases that can expand and contract to accommodate seated or standing work styles. Smaller circular timber tops (hand-turned on lathes for ultra smooth finishes) hover above slim steel bases allowing them to tuck partially under desks to support additional documents or devices when required.
Scattered amongst the café that unites staff socially for meals and informal meetings are mismatched and rotated American Oak veneer tabletops with solid timber edging supported by dual cylindrical bases made from machined MDF with Polyurethane paint finishes. Accentuated by central solid timber bowl features, they collectively suggest a relaxed domestic ambience.
