When the German advertising agency, Liquid Campaign, known for their work with iconic brands such as Lufthansa and BMW, decided to set shop in India, they chose an office on the 14th Floor of a Cyber City building in Gurugam. Overlooking the ongoing metro construction, they turned to the architect team of Ultraconfidentiel to design their office concept like that!
The project brief was this: “You see what is going on there, we want that inside our office.”
With a low budget but high standards in tow Ultraconfidentiel took flight to sourcing a multitude of construction material. Metal slotted sections were transformed into legs of tables, fixed with castors and topped with sheets of extra clear toughened glass to make workstations. Wooden pallet boxes were stacked and strapped to compose of partitions and shelving. Circular concrete slabs were piled to build coffee tables. And petrol drums clustered together marked casual breakout spaces.
With floor to ceiling glazing on one end of the elongated office, the volume is inundated with daylight. Celebrating the natural source and taking advantage of expansive Gurugram vistas, a casual lounge area claims its space near the large windows. The other corner is occupied by a sizeable glass box that encloses a meeting room. This is interestingly intersected by a smaller glass box tilted ever so slightly towards the façade housing the senior leadership. Transparent partitions facilitate a deeper penetration of daylight into the space, reducing the requirement for complex illumination systems.
The lighting scheme follows a simple grid on the ceiling, drawn out in black metallic cable trays that carry in them all the electrical wiring. Wherever required, a wire is pulled through the tray to provide for a workstation below. The rudimentary set up allows for absolute flexibility. These troughs are further studded with a series of locally sourced downlights. Meant for recessed applications, the fixtures are installed against the metal tray in reflection of ‘work-in-progress’, reinforcing the ‘construction site’ theme of the office. While the downlights provide ample ambient light in the open office, each workstation holds a table lamp that caters to the individual preferences of the staff.
Sprinkled across the office, one finds peculiar miniature gas cylinders painted white or black matt, fitted with a lamp that precariously pokes out of the top. These customized lamps were derived from the ingenuity of local vegetable vendors that use them to illuminate goods on their carts. Originally made to be run on gas, the bespoke version in the office houses an LED fixture.
Ultraconfidentiel confesses to having enjoyed the project and being given the opportunity to dig deeper into their caves of creativity. “We would not have able to do this with anyone else. It was possible only because the client was a creative devil himself from an advertising agency.”
