Upfield

With a view of the Gänsemarkt in Hamburg's city centre, the C&W Office Agency Team brokered a light-flooded loft with over a thousand square metres on the top floor. The industrial style with exposed architectural features and large windows not only convinced Upfield immediately, but also inspired the C&W Interior Design Team to come up with initial ideas and designs for the interior.   

It was to be a new work concept with various different zones and formats - depending on the activity: desk workstations, but also creative areas for project groups and collaboration, focus zones for concentrated work and retreat rooms - with sound-proofed telephone boxes for confidential conversations. 

Large and small sofa corners and pantry display shelving highlighting the company's own products were to provide relaxation. All this in an unusual format: the floorplan is 100 metres long, but only 12 metres wide. C&W Interior Design Team had creative freedom to develop the ideas and worked closely with the Upfield project team, who were in the process of finalising the corporate design anyway. Two projects that turned out to be a perfect match for each other. In weekly meetings and with much anticipation, the design concept for the Hamburg space grew. 

Lots of greenery combined with a good pinch of industrial charm was the result. When you enter the new Upfield office in Hamburg, you don't find yourself in front of a classic reception desk, but in a welcome area with 70s design armchairs and casual kilim carpets. It looks out onto a rough-sawn wooden wall with a lasered logo. The ventilation ducts and cable routeing are exposed and stand for agility and reduction to the essentials.

The elongated area with 70 workstations – open plan and bright - is divided by planted shelving partitions and climbing plant grids especially developed for Upfield. They are mobile, can be rearranged as needed, and improve acoustics and air.  

The kitchen, designed specifically for Upfield by C&W’s designers and produced by a Berlin joinery workshop, is a mixture of laboratory and hip Hamburg commercial kitchen. The wood of the kitchen counter contrasts with the cement grey floor. A cooking, dining and meeting area allows customers and staff to experience the products, separated from the office area by a 17-metre-long glass bar wall. 

Definitely another eye-catcher: the show supermarket in the middle of the office and virtually on the lawn - because that's the effect of the green carpeting that wraps the entire office in the corporate colour. Here, Upfield's products are presented in illuminated supermarket refrigerated display cabinets. The customer sits in a lounge-like seating area right in the middle, as if it were a lifestyle bar - the special (customer) experience guaranteed.