A New Way to Work
In all likelihood, the office space you occupy doesn’t quite measure up—in any way, shape, or form—to the Washington, DC, headquarters of the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID). After all, modern buildings routinely expose us to conditions that may compromise our well-being, sabotage our mood, squelch our creativity, and even keep our focus squarely on Friday at 5:00.
“A building can do more than ‘no harm’…it can actually enhance the way that we live.”
Rachel Gutter, president of the International WELL Building Institute
By contrast, every high- and low-tech detail of ASID’s workplace has been reimagined and retrofitted to promote physical and/or mental health, the goal being to positively affect both the well-being and productivity of everyone working there. And the results of this nearly-three-year-old experiment, which may one day serve as a model for a vast assortment of cubicled wastelands, have been so striking that it’s not hard to imagine the staff of 30 collectively uttering the unthinkable: Thank goodness it’s Monday.
Among the many hallmarks of this 7,500-square-foot office is the attention paid to the quality of light. The space purposefully faces northwest, so it’s bathed in a soft ambient shimmer throughout the entire day. The interior lighting is synced to parallel the human body’s circadian rhythm, so the bright, white bulbs that supplement the morning sun gradually give way to warmer, yellow hues that help prepare for the brain’s nightly surge of melatonin, the hormone that aids in the control of daily sleep–wake cycles. Sensors affixed to window mullions calculate glare and, if necessary, automatically raise or lower the shades to regulate its intensity.
Equally notable is the attention to biophilia—the human affinity for the natural world, which creates a positive, healing atmosphere. For example, the office is filled with desktop terrariums, window-ledge greenery, and architectural patterns that mimic the natural world—everything from curved, cloudlike
