Housed in a concrete post-and-beam base building, the Game On and People Can Fly offices bring together motion capture, sound production, and gaming studios, as well as workspaces accommodating a hundred people.
The existing building, a large concrete box characteristic of the post-industrial Parc-Ex area, necessitated some preliminary modifications to allow the space to become habitable. Generous windows on two opposing facades generate the arrangement of workspaces. Even with the addition of these windows, the main challenge for the project was the quality of light, in order to create soothing work areas, while maintaining a clear circulation and distribution strategy for daily users and visitors.
The solution to this problem consisted of positioning the workspaces on the periphery, against the exterior walls, allowing employees to benefit from natural light. In contrast, more closed spaces – the meeting room, individual modules, and common areas – were placed at the heart of the space. The meeting spaces are characterized by materials offering excellent acoustics, curtains to create more intimate moments, and low-key lighting where concentration is required. Conversely, the periphal workspaces have kept the existing white walls and concrete of the building, which provide more neutral and homogeneous lighting.
As such, a duality is created between the two areas. The concrete box and its interior offer a noble and colorful atmosphere with materials such as wood, felt, dark green walls, and soft light, while the periphery fluidly merges into the original space’s palette of raw and minimal materials.
In addition to clearly organizing the workspaces and common areas, the box also simplifies circulation. Distribution occurs between the central and peripheral zones. In certain places, circulation opens up, crosses, and erodes the formality of the box to produce both moments of openness and gathering spaces defined by their informality and serendipity. In this project, these subtractions are key to producing an office where interactions are unexpected and come in varying forms, offering workers a space that is both familiar and stimulating.
