For our first Facebook project, we partnered with Gensler to help design their Mumbai offices. 

We knew right away that this would be challenging as much as it was rewarding. Being one of the world’s leading organisations, Facebook is known to be synonymous with consistency and seamlessness across all their offices around the world. Facebook created a Global Technical Guidelines document to provide aesthetic and performance requirements for products to be used throughout all of its facilities. 

The aesthetic followed their philosophy of ‘work in progress’. Every little level of detail is documented in their brand and design guidelines including the use of certain materials. Materials like exposed concrete flooring and plywood, exposed ceilings and ducting bring the ‘work in progress’ philosophy to life while making no compromises on functionality and comforts of a modern workplace. Our challenge was to provide alternate and optimal material solutions that would resonate the ethos of their overall design philosophy. 

Project Design, delivery and execution also brought about its own set of challenges. Multiple stakeholder teams were working simultaneously in collaboration across geographies as spread out as California, Dublin, Singapore, Tokyo and Mumbai. Despite this, the project was managed efficiently and all the stakeholder teams from around the globe were constantly engaged working like one unified team to make sure each one played their part optimally. 

Facebook also promotes in a program called Artists in Residence where they engage with local artists who create art directly on the facades of the office premises which brings a distinct local flavour to the workspace. 

The final delivery at the end of 180 days was an office that was completely in sync with Facebook’s brand guideline and philosophy. Testament to this was when one of the senior executives at Facebook said “This office could be anywhere in the world and I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. It is absolutely on point with the quality and standards that we have come to expect from Facebook workplaces.”

Apart from Mumbai, we also worked on Facebook projects in Delhi, Gurugram and Hyderabad.