Heavybit Industries is a co-working space designed for early stage companies making cloud software developer products. The Heavybit program curates, fosters and promotes innovation and solution-finding through invited presentations, public events, education, advising, and inter-developer collaboration. The client brief aimed to transform the existing former warehouse into a collaborative workspace. This includes on the first floor a large kitchen, collective dining area for daily catered lunches that could double for speaker presentations, conference room, bike storage, and informal work areas; and on the two upper floors an open array of desks, comfortable and intimate meeting areas, bar height workspace and conference rooms. The client also wished to retain the industrial character of the building and to emphasize its physical and vintage industrial qualities as a conceptual contrast to the ephemerality of the cloud.
Given the project brief and a limited budget, the program is addressed through a series of designed interventions inserted into the existing shell. The largest of these is a multi-functioning platform at ground level with a new stair leading to the second floor. The platform, constructed as a “solid” laminated plywood object houses the reception desk located opposite the main entry, bar-height work counter, presenter stage facing the dining area, pass-through ramp, and U-shaped lounge seating. The platform is located to spatially subdivide the first floor while keeping it visually open, and also serves as the landing for the suspended stair. The stair itself is suspended from a series steel fins which also become the stair risers. The effect of the stair is at once heavy and light: from the rear it appears as a series of steel plates, and from the side it almost disappears.
The hexagonal perforated steel used between the fins affords this transparency and also refers to the company logo’s abstracted hex nut. On the second floor, the fins extend upward to become a guardrail for the stair, integrating a bar height work-bar on one side. The ground floor conference room and bike room are defined by a wall of gray reclaimed wood and glass, and the kitchen is made of dark stained plywood. The stair’s black steel reappears at a detail level, framing wall openings and in the kitchen as a large folded steel island countertop. The second and third floor workspaces are planned as an open environment with several conference rooms on each floor. The conference rooms are defined by sliding walls constructed of Polygal over a steel frame, incorporating custom steel barn door hardware. Informal work and meeting space on the second level is defined by a stacked plywood continuous window seat along the perimeter.
IwamotoScott created three smaller design-build interventions - as projects within the larger project. These include the “rope room” on the third level, and also “hexcell light” over the kitchen island, and “hexcell ceiling”, a fabric light diffuser in the first floor conference room. Both “hexcell” installations use a hexagonal plan pattern that recall the Heavybit logo, but in different ways. The hexcell light is made from thin, contoured, blackened brake-formed steel with Edison lightbulbs in the spirit of the existing building, while the hexcell ceiling is a lightweight tensile structure made of ordinary non-woven mesh. In each case, as with the stair and platform, these installations attempt to defy the predictable qualities of the ordinary materials from which they are made.
Awards:
- Architizer 2014 A+ Awards, Popular Choice winner, Office Interiors category
- Architizer 2014 A+ Awards, Finalist, Architecture + Workspace category
- Architect's Newspaper, First Annual 2014 Best Of Design Awards, Best Interior
- AIA CA 2013 Design Awards, Merit Award, Interior Architecture
- AIA SF 2013 Design Awards, Merit Award, Interior Architecture
- Architectural Record, Editors' Picks: Best Of 2013, "Office Where We Would Most Like To Work"
