How Can An Office Building Embrace The Concept Of Placemaking?
The term “Placemaking” is certainly not a new term, but it’s now influencing commercial developers in new ways. According to the Project for Public Spaces, placemaking is inspiring people to collectively reimagine and reinvent public spaces as the heart of every community. In this week’s blog, we feature an article from Bisnow.com that talks about placemaking, and how Rosslyn City Center, in Rosslyn, Virginia is utilizing placemaking with its development planning. If Cresa can help with your development plans, let’s talk – www.tenant-broker.com.
How Can An Office Building Embrace
The Concept Of Placemaking?
Bisnow Washington DC Office
May 10, 2022 Rosslyn City Center Julia Troy,
Studio B Editor
Placemaking is a word that has popped up often in the
last few years in reference to community development, but it’s an idea that is
still lost on many developers.
The Project for Public Spaces defines placemaking
as a concept that “inspires people to collectively reimagine and reinvent
public spaces as the heart of every community” and “facilitates creative
patterns of use, paying particular attention to the physical, cultural, and
social identities that define a place and support its ongoing evolution … and
is a crucial and deeply-valued process for those who feel intimately connected
to the places in their lives.”
Placemaking turns an office complex from a place where
people conduct business into a landmark that celebrates a city and its
community. It gives, as the Project for Public Spaces puts it, “planners,
designers, and engineers the broad value of moving beyond the narrow focus of
their own professions, disciplines [and] agendas.”
Placemaking may not be top of mind for office developers,
but it should be. As companies strive to retain top talent while looking for
ways to encourage employees to come back to the office, they need to create a
different type of environment if they want to stay ahead of the game. A survey
Microsoft conducted in 2021 found that 41% of the global workforce
would consider switching jobs in the next year and 55% reported that work
environment would play a role in their decisions.
“Placemaking is a nice metaphor for how we want the office
to function,” Georgia Collins, co-lead of CBRE’s Workplace Strategy practice,
told BOMA magazine. “In cities, we have places where people gather and the
community comes together, such as parks or civic spaces. In offices, café
spaces or hubs serve a similar purpose. There are a lot of great parallels to
be drawn between what makes great cities and the creation of purpose-built
office spaces.”
For an office building to truly stand out in today's market,
the offices and employee common areas must create a sense of community and
connection for employees and tenants but also for the community as a
whole.
One office complex that has accomplished this
is Rosslyn City Center, in Rosslyn, Virginia. Built 40 years ago, this
22-story office tower and obsolete mall underwent a $35M transformation as part
of American Real Estate Partners' vision for the property. Today, it
is a space that not only embraces the personal and social needs of its tenants
but of the entire community of Rosslyn, with reimagined workspaces,
experiential shared environments and a two-floor indoor and outdoor dining and
social space that is open to the public and designed to be the center of
gravity in the neighborhood.
“Placemaking is personal for us and is embedded in AREP’s
DNA,” said Louise Boulton-Lear, AREP vice president of brand
marketing. “There is no business as usual, we are always looking for ways to
elevate. Simply put, we want our buildings — and our customers' experience in
them, to be engaging, comfortable and connected to their needs. At the root of
Rosslyn’s transformation is creative and thoughtful people-centric placemaking.”
Rosslyn City Center is situated on top of one of the
Washington region's busiest Metro stations at 1700 North Moore St., which is
how it got the nickname “the gateway to Rosslyn.” It includes move-in ready
spec suites to suit a variety of companies’ needs and a host of features and
amenities that were crafted with wellness in mind. The building has
received WELL Health-Safety rating and UL Healthy Building
verification for Indoor Air and Water, as well as LEED Gold
certification for its commitment to sustainability.
Among the features that are open to the public are the 30K
SF Gold’s Gym with boutique-style classes, 3D body scanning and a 1,400 SF
training terrace, and Assembly, a two-floor dining experience. Assembly
can host 625 customers in its indoor and outdoor spaces and includes eight
different food concepts and a wine cellar.
To further embrace the placemaking
concept, AREP partnered with local artists No Kings
Collective to create a 67-by-50-foot mural titled "Dream Big."
This massive piece of public art boasts clouds with vectored shapes to create
an ethereal image to inspire the entire community.
“Rosslyn’s bold future is built on transformation,”
said Paul Schulman, principal and chief operating officer for AREP.
“The past decade has seen Rosslyn grow into a major commercial center and an
exciting place to live. AREP is proud to be part of this transformation with
projects like Rosslyn City Center.”
The idea behind RCC, Schulman notes, is not just to create
an office space for companies, but a communal space that Rosslyn residents can
be proud to call their own.
“We want RCC to be a place to connect with experiential
shared environments and exciting new food options unlike any other in Rosslyn
or the DMV,” Schulman said. “It’s all about connection and community. We
thoughtfully redeveloped Rosslyn City Center to provide flexibility and
adaptability and embrace personal and social needs of our tenant customers, and
community who work and live in Rosslyn.”
End of Article
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