ACWA POWER

Office interior design

Area: 13,000 sq.ft.

Location: The One Tower, TECOM

Scope: Design + Build

ACWA Power is a developer, investor and operator of power generation and desalinated water plants with a presence across 12 countries.

Brief/Challenges

The initial brief was to transform the space and make it as innovative, interesting and creative as possible. However, the senior management team re-briefed the new office to conform to the design on the other floors, making for a more uniform and less divisive employee experience.

Discover | Design | Deliver

Back to the drawing board, the design team replicated the simplicity of existing offices, but added the right touches of colour, liveliness and collaboration to make it modern and appealing. Collaborative spaces included meeting rooms, meeting pods, and bar stools around high desks with writeable walls.

We also used bean bags near open working spaces and pods for those who wanted to tuck themselves away and work in privacy. Mini desk partitions between workstations kept the openness and still gave people a modicum of privacy. We created clever and generous storage space throughout without taking away from the overall space. We designed a dedicated space for consultants with quick access to toilets and pantries, and common spaces to collaborate. Yet they were within a security bubble as these groups are plugged into corporate systems.

Colour palette: muted whites, greys and beiges gave it an instant corporate feel, and we added pops of colour in the meeting pods, modular stool-like seating in the waiting lounge, and on the workstation partitions. For a very large office, this added vibrancy and relieved the monotony.

Furniture and finishes: custom-built furniture used the space effectively, carpets cushioned footfall and noise. We build toilets with clean and crisp lines, and the finishes overall echoed the brand’s colours.