Pilot break room in an existing building - A new module of the Office Concept UZH

Initial situation:

• A regular UZH institute evaluation reveals a need for better opportunities for informal collegial exchange and breaks for employees
• The new institute coffee machine is actively used
• Spatial resources: good accessibility, view partly into the open, greenery and distant view, access to balcony, semi-private location
• Structural challenges: 40m2 space for 120 employees, room acoustics and noise emissions, direct sunlight in summer and dark asphalt area directly adjacent to building side, space being without air conditioning
• Challenges organizationally: different team sizes and cultures, heterogeneous work resources of institute members

Aims:

• Former library, which was successively converted into a common room, is to be upgraded into a break room that supports needs from the institute evaluation and supplementary user needs analysis
• Inclusion of the furniture requirements from the use case in the cantonal furniture retender, so that a new furniture standard for the office module "Break room Irchel existing building" is made possible

Procedure:

• Post-Occupancy Evaluation and User Needs Analysis
• New utilization concept, new materialization
• 3-D visualization of new concept and materialization, 3 variants of color concept
• Participative vote on new color concept
• Inclusion of the furniture requirements from the use case in the cantonal furniture retender
• Reconstruction
• Inauguration and name baptism "PharmaLounge" of the break room
• Pulse feedbacks
• Fine adjustments
• After approx. 8-12 months, review of target achievement by systematic measurement of UZH and institute evaluation goals

Note: 40m2 for 120 institute members, little choice of behaviour settings for work breaks and recovery, several stimuli that undermine mental recovery processes and relaxation

Status of redesign: During puls feedback phase, before finetuning.

Note: several break behaviour settings available which put the location advantages into value, visualisation of ideas and events possible, different colour concept, plants and materialization than in the work area to facilitate mental being-away during the breaks.

Photos: B. Degenhardt.