Office furniture has, for a long time, been subject to an aesthetic power structure, communicating the perceived status of employee using it.
However, the corner office with its oversized desk and high-back swivel chair has become an outdated trope of success and corporate climbing in the modern workplace, creating an environment that isn't conducive to collaboration across all levels of the business, ensuring that all voices are heard.
It’s this that the new PORTS office concept from Bene aims to address. Referencing maritime, technological and management set-ups, PORTS looks to create a space that functions as an exchange, with each unit a hub part of a larger system.
This is manifested in a design line created by London-based studio Pearson Lloyd, focusing on three core areas – Table, Lounge and Storage, which can be combined to create a flexible space that offers both public and private, and relaxed and formal working arenas.
It’s in this flexibility that traditional leadership hierarchies are challenged within the new office design.
“The market for executive offices and furniture is still defined in terms of… old concepts of status, without considering the users’ needs,” says Tom Lloyd, cofounder of Pearson Lloyd. “The market has not changed for over a century.”