‘s Jinmao Capital J-Space Office is a tribute to Stanley Kubrick’s unforgettable masterpiece 2001: A Space Odyssey. J-Space, an interior at 4,427 square metres and inhabiting four storeys of a newly built tower, is designed to offer a unique breakaway from workers’ 996 culture (working from 9 to 9, six days per week) with classic cinematic tropes often found in space-age films.
This resides in Shangdi, an administrative division known for advance technology within the Haidan district northwest of . The clients, a real estate and finance corporation Jinmao Capital and freelancer marketing website Zhubajie requested a collaborative environment for their employers and clients. The architects, determined to inspire employees’ work ethic by immersing the area’s pride, decided upon an intergalactic interior.
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The design is made almost in parallel to Kubric’s film – each level and turn on every floor is dedicated to chapters spliced from Space Odyssey’s narrative. The architects imagined the new building as a ‘luminous’ alien object that’s unassumingly descended among a neighbourhood of other giant innovative tech companies. Visitors (or ‘astronauts’ in this scenario) are immediately drawn in by a tunnel disguising storage amenity. Walking down the long-drawn tunnel, travellers are whisked away into a never-ending path while being mesmerized by moving images of a plasma ball-like pattern before turning left towards a set of the geometric golden staircase that ascends upwards to office spaces, gyms, infant room or coffee zone on the fourth floor.
Upper floors are consistent in layout, comprised of a combination of open or closed work zones bordering the edges, while communal activities are focused at the central area. Bright white walls and spaces encased in walls allow a sense of togetherness, with fluorescent tubes arranged in a cross as a nod to industrialism and angled mirrors distracting from the white exposed ceiling. Peppered grey carpets line the floor, although certain spaces are reserved for white-tiled disco dance floors. With added steel benches and metal furniture, the overall mood does feel clinical. Although the circular motifs and elements found in doors, the signage and wall-mounted CD players, and futuristic spherical furniture that looks like it’s been pieced from savaged parts of a rocket, add a playful touch.
In such an otherworldly environment, DAGA Architects strategically returns earthy elements that hold a fictional narrative, while providing a sense of familiarity within the coworking space. Upon entry, before the stairs and around communal kitchen areas, are internal Zen gardens dotted with Gongshi for the tactile crunch. A disguising an elevator shaft stretches across the upper three floors, while floating moss-covered rocks are suspended like meteorites frozen in time. A touch of green spawns on the planters and walls are used for implied separation – a gentle reminder that nature will always remain a precious resource despite the rush for effective technology.
Five, four, three, two, one… add in a space-themed soundtrack and a muffled countdown, we have found ourselves within our own spacesuits as we launch into and work within DAGA Architects’ theatrical office space design. With encouraging memos such as “Let’s Keep A Little Optimism Here” imprinted on thresholds and eccentric characteristics and circulation, perhaps the outcome is an interpretation to the designers’ response to Space Odyssey’s open ending.
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