# Manufacturing Company Office Design: One Floor, Three Colour Options

> Our concept design for the office floor of a manufacturing company: open bench desks down the middle, a ring of cabins and team rooms around them, a boardroom, a meeting and lounge suite with its own pantry and washroom, and support rooms at the ends. The same plan is shown in three colour options: sage and ivory, grey and orange, and olive and mauve.

## The brief

One office floor for a manufacturing company, in a steel-framed building on its site. It
had to hold the whole management and support team: open desks for most people, cabins for
the heads of department, rooms for the MD and the plant head, a design team, technical
and accounts teams, a boardroom, places to meet visitors, and the support rooms that
make a floor work all day.

The deck took one plan through **26 numbered views** and showed it in **three colour
options**. The plan and furniture stay the same in all three.

## The plan: open middle, rooms around the edge

| Zone | What sits there |
| --- | --- |
| Centre of the floor | Bench desks in nine rows, a coffee counter and an informal lounge with a planted corner |
| One long wall | MD / CEO, plant head and design team cabins, plus a small meeting room |
| Other long wall | A row of HOD cabins, accounts and purchase with its HOD, and the document room |
| One end | Meeting and lounge suite with its own pantry and washroom, the main conference room, the technical team and its HOD |
| Other end | Double-height reception and lift arrival, visitor meeting, washrooms and the stair |

Three decisions drive it:

- **The open desks take the middle, where daylight reaches from both sides.** Cabins on
  the long walls are glazed to the corridor, so they do not cut the light off.
- **Every team sits next to its head.** HOD cabins line the wall nearest their teams
  instead of being grouped in a separate management wing.
- **Visitors stay at the reception end.** The visitor meeting room sits by reception and
  the lift, so outsiders do not walk the length of the work floor.

Related: [open-plan vs cabin office layout](/compare/open-plan-vs-cabin-office-layout) ·
[workstation density](/glossary/workstation-density) ·
[workplace strategy and space planning](/services/interior-fit-out/workplace-strategy-and-space-planning)

## The rooms

**Open workplace.** Long bench desks with fabric screens, sage pedestals topped with
planters at the end of each run, and full-height windows along the side. The roof is left
as exposed steel deck with the cable trays and ducts in view; **suspended acoustic rafts**
over the desks and linear lights run with the desk rows do the work a full false ceiling
would.

**Cabin corridor.** Glass to the work floor on one side, with a frosted band at eye
height; sage doors, framed prints and a lit niche on the other.

**Design team cabin.** A desk with a pin-up wall of drawings and finishes behind it, a
shelf of material samples, and a sofa for reviews. It is the one cabin set up for
looking at things together.

**Meeting and lounge suite.** Soft seating on a round rug in front, a round table for
eight with a screen and two writing boards behind, and its own pantry and washroom. It
works as a board lounge, a client dining room or a second meeting room.

**Main conference room.** A long table, a screen on a fabric acoustic panel, and a glass
writing wall down one side.

**Accounts and purchase.** One shared oak table, a large whiteboard and storage under the
window line, next door to the accounts HOD.

**Informal lounge.** Sofa and armchairs off the work floor, screened by a planter and
oak slats, with the coffee counter close by.

Related: [meeting room design and sizing](/services/interior-fit-out/meeting-room-design-and-sizing) ·
[glass partitions and doors](/services/interior-fit-out/glass-partitions-and-doors) ·
[acoustic design for offices](/services/interior-fit-out/acoustic-design-for-offices)

## Three colour options

| Option | Joinery and walls | Accent |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 01 Sage, ivory and mineral grey | Sage laminate, ivory walls, stone-look floor, oak slats | Tan leather and a soft orange |
| 02 Grey and orange | Mid-grey laminate and grey bouclé on the same floor | Orange, used sparingly |
| 03 Olive and mauve | Green stone, sage joinery | Mauve and plum upholstery |

All three use the same perforated acoustic ceiling tile, the same oak slat, and the same
line-drawn wall art of leaves, sun and process sketches. The wall art is what gives the
floor its character, and it is the cheapest part to change when the company's story
moves on.

Related: [laminate and veneer](/materials/laminate-and-veneer) ·
[acoustic wall panel](/materials/acoustic-wall-panel) ·
[workstations and office furniture](/services/interior-fit-out/workstations-and-office-furniture)

## What to settle before construction drawings

- **Headcount by department**, today and in three years, which fixes the desk rows and
  the number of HOD cabins.
- **Whether the main conference room needs video conferencing**, which decides its
  camera wall and acoustic treatment.
- **The services strategy for the exposed roof**: duct, tray and light routes have to
  be drawn as carefully as the furniture when nothing hides them.
- **Document room capacity**, in running metres of files, before the cabinet run is
  sized.
- **Which colour option**, chosen from samples in daylight on site, not from screens.

## Taking it to site

We deliver office floors like this as a single design and build package:
[turnkey office fit-out](/services/interior-fit-out/turnkey-office-fit-out) ·
[fit-out MEP coordination](/services/interior-fit-out/fit-out-mep-coordination) ·
[office lighting design](/services/interior-fit-out/office-lighting-design) ·
[factories and manufacturing](/industries/factories-and-manufacturing)

**Planning an office at your plant?** Send the floor plan and the headcount by
department. [Talk to the design team](/contact).

## Frequently asked questions

### How should an office floor at a manufacturing site be laid out?

Open desks in the middle where the daylight reaches across, and enclosed rooms around the edge. In this plan the bench desks run in nine rows down the centre of the floor, with HOD cabins along one long wall, the MD, plant head and design team rooms along the other, and the boardroom, lounge suite and washrooms at the ends. Everyone sits within a short walk of their head of department, and the cabins never block the windows from the open floor.

### Which rooms does a plant office need beyond desks?

More than a typical corporate floor. This one carries an MD or CEO cabin, a plant head's cabin, a design team room with a pin-up wall and sample shelf, a technical team room with its own HOD, accounts and purchase with an HOD cabin, a document room lined with full-height storage, a main conference room, a small meeting room, a visitor meeting room, a meeting and lounge suite, a coffee counter and an informal lounge.

### Can an office look finished under an exposed steel roof?

Yes, if the services are organised rather than hidden. Here the open workplace leaves the steel deck, cable trays and ducts visible, with suspended acoustic rafts over the desks and linear lights run in line with the desk rows. The cabins and meeting rooms get closed ceilings. That saves a full false ceiling over the largest area and keeps the height of a factory building.

### Why offer three colour options instead of three layouts?

Because the layout is decided by the work, and the colour is decided by taste. All three options keep the same plan, the same furniture types and the same joinery; they change the laminate, upholstery and accent colour. That makes the choice quick, and it means the cost difference between options is small.

### How do you add character to an office without covering it in branding?

Use line art and planting. This design draws sun, leaf and process sketches on the walls in a thin line, frames botanical prints, and uses planter pedestals and a planted screen to break up the work floor. It reads as one company's office without a logo on every wall, and wall art is the cheapest part of an office to change later.

### Can Hagerstone design and build an office floor like this?

Yes. Send the floor plan, the headcount by department and the rooms you need, and we will prepare concept options like these, with a layout, material boards and 3D views, before anything is drawn for construction. Then we build it as a design and build fit-out.

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Source: https://hagerstone.com/our-designs/manufacturing-company-office-design-three-colour-options