HHQ provides a new working environment for HearDis!, Agency for Corporate Sound, placed in a former textile factory in Stuttgart. Following the principle „after the network comes the swarm“ Studio SEEBALD. analysed the potential of the new space and the user mix.

The brief:
Flexible Usage, Team Orientated Work, Individual Retreat Areas, Recreation Space, Meeting Rooms, Communal Eating and Drinking, Staging of Event (both internal and for rent), Showroom, Expansion and Cooperation.

Cooperation defines HHQ, both in terms of the design process and the realized project. HearDis! and SEEBALD. decided during the design process to use the spaces together and to seek further cooperation partners who would benefit from the flexible structure. Today, together with the agency and the architecture studio the spaces are enjoyed by Christian Fischbacher GmbH, LATI NOS and Gold & Wirtschaftswunder.

With the refurbishment the existing structure has been exposed and the original open character of the interior re-established. The white painted, concrete structural frame dominates the room, providing it with a clear order and with the columns defining a central axis, with 2 distinct areas: the communal and the working. The working area consists of 5 islands, each with 4 workstations. The ends of the room are marked by dark painted steel-framed glazed screens. Behind each are located office and meeting rooms. The floor is roughly sanded and sealed with a transparent, matt coating exposing the earth tones of the original concrete screed. All other surfaces remain white, allowing the colours of the surrounding buildings and courtyard trees to filter through the generous windows around the perimeter of the room.

The office space is served by 2 staircases, each providing a separate entrance. The visitors to HearDis! enter via a black wooden cube with its black coconut matting, before opening up towards the office. A narrower room describes the entrance to the architect’s studio, with a small lobby area defined by curtains. The lobby provides a sheltered place to dwell, which can be completely opened up when required. Opposite the Kitchen, Stores and Restrooms, the core facilities for the various users are united within a free- standing roughly-hewn, black pine box.

Further functions are revealed slowly and deliberately; the white mosaic tiles of the kitchen firstly exposed once the shutters are winched open, with the toilets and showers reached via a daylight-flooded corridor along the outer facade after passing the planted wall which characterises the communal dining area.

All workstation tables are adjustable. White work surfaces are complimented by black edge trims and legs. The white meeting room tables sit atop browned frames. The deep, white painted window boards flank the workstations and provide for cable routing, storage and the integrated LED bands which afford background office lighting. Black recycled tablelamps, together with tables with seating banks salvaged from an inn and ethnic carpets are used to emphasise the flexible furnishings. A Mirror used to mark the exit reflects the visitor surrounded by the agency.

Design: SEEBALD. Studio für Architektur und Gestaltung / Christoph Seebald
Photography: David Frank