Why This Architect Thinks Cool Office Amenities Will Be Important Going Forward

PDR's Larry Lander Argues Amenities Are More Important in Work-from-Home Era
Cafes and to-go food options in buildings could become more popular post-pandemic as communal food and buffets lose favor. (PDR)
Cafes and to-go food options in buildings could become more popular post-pandemic as communal food and buffets lose favor. (PDR)

Bicycle lockers, fancy cafes and lush rooftop gardens all became popular lures for tenants before the pandemic. But as major tech companies and office trend-setters such as Facebook and Twitter extend work-from-home policies, the emphasis on cool building amenities might be lost as budgets go toward HVAC systems and thermal cameras.

Even as a tremendous workplace shift is underfoot, now isn’t the time to abandon amenities in office spaces, argues a leader at the prominent architecture firm PDR. Instead, landlords and tenants should double down on creating an environment where employees want to work, said Larry Lander, a principal at PDR.

The Houston-based architecture firm has Fortune 1000 clients such as Exxon Mobil, Texas Instruments, USAA, Hewlett Packard, Chevron and Marathon Oil. PDR opened a Dallas office earlier this year and also has an office in Austin, Texas, but does work all over the world.

Lander thinks creating a "human-centric" office environment will become even more important as companies try to draw workers back to the office and recreate a sense of community after lockdowns. The usual building perks like outdoor plazas, fitness centers, cafes, restaurants, bicycle storage, lounges and conference centers won’t necessarily disappear in a post-pandemic world – they’ll just look a little different, more spacious and more sanitized, he said.

“The base case is it’s got to be safe and it’s got to instill confidence that it’s safe and it needs to be secure, those are the give-ins. But beyond that, it needs to be a place that I want to go,” Lander said in an interview with CoStar News. “Now that I have this choice about whether I show up or not" at the office, he said, "what is compelling and makes me want to go there?”

Larry Lander is principal and director of programming at PDR. (PDR)
Larry Lander is principal and director of programming at PDR. (PDR)

For starters, cleaning will become an amenity and a bragging point for landlords, he suspects. He expects new building safety and cleanliness certifications to emerge, similar to sustainability certifications that have become popular as a way to distinguish a building. Janitors will no longer be an "after 5 p.m." worker but a visible part of the building’s day-to-day buzz.

“I think cleaning is going to become a visible and transparent activity. It doesn’t have to be after dark or when someone goes home,” he said. Property owners who can show their extensive sanitation and cleaning efforts will have a “leg up,” he expects.

Restaurants inside multitenant office buildings can become places where landlords can demonstrate their cleaning commitments, he noted. Cafes and restaurants offering to-go meals inside office buildings could become more important for tenants who would otherwise offer free communal food and meals to employees, he said. And instead of the free food within a tenant’s office, Lander suggested tenants could give employees branded coolers on their desks where they can manage their own lunches and snacks.

Lander also sees lounge areas and common rooms doubling as secondary spaces for employees to take a laptop or work with social distancing, almost as an extension of an existing desk space, he noted.

“The cool lobby center, the conference center, the outdoor garden where I could go [work], those will augment office space,” he said. “The landlord that can convey that level of amenity, they’re going to have a huge leg up.”

Spruced up greenspaces and outdoor plazas were already popular before the pandemic, but he’s already seeing clients emphasize those spaces for outdoor work and meetings.

“Buildings that have outdoor spaces or the ability to create and to make them ‘meeting ready,’ that is a huge opportunity and landlords are very interested in that,” Lander said. Even in hotter climates or during the summer months, landlords can create outdoor meeting spaces with shade, fans and even pump air conditioning into outdoor areas, he noted.

As for indoor meeting spaces, Lander said he’s already noticed falling popularity of big conference rooms with 20-foot long, hard-to-move conference tables. Instead, he is working with clients on how to design meeting rooms with movable components and furniture to accommodate smaller or spaced-out groups.

Lightning-fast internet connections and high-tech components that allow people to more easily plug into virtual meeting platforms will also become a more important part of conference rooms and buildings, he suspects. Removing doors to conference rooms and common areas and adding touchless commands and touchless elevators is gaining popularity, too, Lander and other architects have noted.

While social distancing and cleanliness is on everyone’s minds now, Lander thinks some of these practices and building design changes will have lasting impacts even if a coronavirus vaccine is available. He likens it to before 9/11, when airport security procedures like removing shoes would have seemed excessive but are now commonplace.

“I think that some of [these] things at a fundamental level will be with us for a very long time," he said.

Lander said he still sees tenants using office space and amenities as a recruitment tool for hiring and retaining top employees after the recession.

"I think that successful companies that thrive and accelerate out of where we are now are going to be the companies that put people first," he said.