The company world’s return to the workplace is in full swing. Staff throughout world corporations like Amazon, JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs have been referred to as again to the workplace 5 days per week. In early December, Instagram turned the newest agency to announce a return-to-office mandate, with CEO Adam Mosseri justifying the transfer to spice up worker “cooperation” and “creativity”.
But, many employees have dreaded the return to bodily workplaces, and argued that hybrid work permits for flexibility with out shedding productiveness. This presents a brand new post-pandemic problem for office designers, who should now construct engaging areas to attract staff again to the workplace, stated Ray Yuen, the workplace managing director at architectural agency Gensler.
“We’re no longer just designing workplaces, we’re actually designing experiences,” stated Yuen, on the Fortune Brainstorm Design discussion board in Macau on Dec. 2. “You’ve really got to make the campus or the workplace more than work, and that’s the fun part of it.”
Citing outcomes from a 2025 survey by his agency, Yuen stated that when requested what makes for good workplaces, staff more and more named components akin to meals and wellness.
“They didn’t even mention anything about work—everybody just picked the stuff that we really want as human beings,” he added.
As such, office designers like Yuen want to consider tips on how to reimagine trendy workplaces. He pointed to a undertaking Gensler labored on in Tokyo, Japan, for an organization the place 50% of its employees members had been working from house.
“We designed it [their office] with 15 different food offerings, including trying to bring Blue Bottle in. We ended up [also] designing a secret [vinyl] bar,” stated Yuen.
Firms have additionally been looking for extra transformable workspaces, Yuen added, and inside designers have responded by changing built-in areas with modular, detachable furnishings. “[This way,] you can transform a space when you need to, from an F&B [space] for the staff, to an events space or a happy hour space for your clients.”
The consumer wants for areas are additionally turning into extra complicated, Yuen stated. Airports, as an example, not function meagre transit hubs however are additionally locations the place vacationers can work or relaxation.
Now, airports have “a lot more outdoor-indoor space [and] natural light, past the actual check-in area. Airport [experiences] used to be just you checking in, and sitting there, waiting,” the designer stated. “It’s a destination, it’s no longer just a [place of] transit.”
As with different fields, synthetic intelligence can also be rewriting the playbook for designers.
Yuen recounted how some shoppers have pulled up visuals on AI picture turbines like Google’s Nano Banana Professional, earlier than asking: “If they can do it in a second, why can’t design firms do it quicker?”
Many designers historically regard time and craftsmanship as core tenets of design, however AI is pushing them to alter the best way they work, Yuen stated. Purchasers now need “immediate response, immediate gratification,” he continued.
“With AI, we’re now almost like a creator [of] all these art pieces, and we try to select what is suitable—that’s the only way we can manage that need from clients on speed and time,” stated Yuen.
