How can workplace design facilitate discussion and teamwork, while ensuring productivity and client privacy? It’s not an easy question in banking and finance, an industry dealing with particularly sensitive information, and especially not when the corporate office is over 16,000 sq-m. However, D&A (Designers and Architecture Oman), led by architect and managing director Fadi Sibai, found a practical answer for the Oman Arab Bank’s headquarters together with workplace spatial solutions company Fantoni.
The design of the Muscat headquarters in Al-Ghubra reaffirms the strong, contemporary Arabian identity of the bank through a carefully chosen colour and material palette. The interior is comprised of soundscapes – the reception, break out areas and meeting rooms are equipped with furniture and sound-absorbent solutions to suit their various functionalities. Glass windows and full-height storage cabinets delineate different spaces without completely separating them; acoustic panels, materials and structures are installed according to the function of different areas; break out areas have their own distinctive identities.
The result is a coordinated whole of individual parts, each with their own character and colour that harmonizes with the central theme of collaboration.