Gensler Captures the Spirit of the Midwest for the LinkedIn Office in Omaha, Nebraska

2022 Best of Year Winner for Large Tech Office

Nebraska is not necessarily known as a destination for cutting-edge design and culture. However, the new Omaha office of LinkedIn, the professional networking giant with nearly a billion users, tapped into the deep-seated tradition of innovation and dynamism that has historically defined the Midwestern metropolis. “From the beginning, there was an emphasis on making sure the decisions were an honest reflection of the city,” LinkedIn senior design manager Virginia Alexander recalls. Longtime partner Gensler was a natural choice for the project, as LinkedIn has worked with the firm on interiors and branding for more than a dozen of the company’s offices around the globe.

How Employee Research Informed the LinkedIn Office Design

Concepting for the hybrid work experience was both a technical and a cultural challenge, so Gensler and LinkedIn conducted research, surveys, and workshops with staffers to understand what made them tick, both professionally and personally. “We were challenged to consider how our designs and technology could make working more engaging and equi­table,” Alexander says. Out of the discovery process came a host of amenities including a dynamic tech-ready team space for hybrid collaboration called the Lab, two libraries for heads-down focus work, recreation rooms with a golf simulator and rotating arcade games, music rooms, terraces, and a cafeteria called the Almanac, with revolving food kiosks and LinkedIn’s first all-electric kitchen.

Health, wellness, and resilience emer­ged as key themes, so in addition to an on-site fitness center and an outdoor roof deck, as well as incorporating no- or low-VOC materials and finishes and only reclaimed or FSC–certified timber, the campus contains four respite rooms sprinkled throughout. Ranging in size and design, the tech-free spaces have ambient light to support a variety of ways to re-energize mind and body. “Everyone resets their brains differently,” Dubisar says. “Some need calming spaces, others something more tactile and hands-on. Rather than a generic ‘wellness room,’ we have different spaces so people can choose the one that fits them best.” They also should help the project achieve its pending Fitwel 2 Star certification, along with a fire stair surrounded by bold graphics and with motivational phrases integrated into treads to encourage staff to take them instead of the elevator.

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Office Culture Meets Local Culture 

The final theme to emerge was expressing Omaha’s particularities of place. “We looked to the historical significance of craft in Omaha and the overall notion of going against the current,” Cavaliere says. Civic storytelling begins in the two-story atrium lobby with a stair backed by a double-height wall of whitewashed brick, a traditional building material in Nebraska. Sculptures by Japan-born Omaha artist Jun Kaneko animate the welcome experience on the ground level, as do Gensler’s integrated wall graphics and site-specific art installations that nod to Omaha’s agrarian roots and contemporary culture. Conference-room graphics referencing the Max, a longstanding Omaha LGBTQIA+ nightclub, quickly became a LinkedIn staff favorite. “It’s incredibly meaningful for people to feel represented not just in their city but also their workplace,” Cavaliere states.

Ultimately, this place-based narrative could be a stronger draw for employees to return to the office than more traditional amenities. “The purpose of the workplace today is to reinforce a sense of community and culture,” Dubisar says. “The office should make you better and support the whole self. At the same time, it’s a place for people to come together and strengthen relationships.” As Linked­In’s global real estate portfolio continues to grow, prioritizing personal expression and community connectivity in the workplace seems only fitting for a company that’s staking its claim as the world’s largest professional network.

Gensler: randy howder; laura richardson; chad wyman; marissa everling; ben vela; chad spurlin; samantha lewis; jeffrey ding; fang fang, eric mortensen (interiors); jennifer hamilton; tiffany ricardo; jarrod holt; marie achterhof, Miriam Diaz, victoria chau, Brian newman (branding); Gail napell, nova punongbayan (sustainability advisors)

tucci lighting: lighting consultant

acrylicize: signage

morrissey engineering: mep

urban evolutions through imperial woodworking company: millwork

lockwood construction: general contractor

glen-gery: brick (lobby)

carl hansen & søn: white chairs

muuto: gray chairs (lobby), sofa (coffee bar)

dum: stools (lobby, coffee bar)

grand rapids chair co.: stools (reception, cafeteria)

sancal: lounge chairs (coffee bar)

Mattiazzi: chairs

Lindner: ceiling mesh (elevator lobby)

barbican: ceiling fixtures (elevator lobby, cafeteria, neigh­borhood)

pinnacle lighting: pendant fixtures (confererence room)

allermuir: chairs

hollis + morris: pendant fixtures (cafeteria)

blu dot; de vorm; hightower: chairs

Lambert et Fils: pendant fixtures

corral: chairs (canteen)

stylex: sofas

menu: stools (workstation)

andlight: downlights

kvadrat: panel fabric

tretford: carpet

bernhardt design: sofas (neigh­borhood)

pair: custom communal table, custom shelving

most modest: lamp

Maharam: seating fabric

Moore & Giles: seating upholstery

rad furniture: custom tables

filzfelt: felt

one workplace; two furnish: furniture suppliers

er2: custom graphics installation

Benjamin Moore & Co.; Dunn-Edwards; Farrow & Ball; Sherwin-Williams Company: paint

LSM Modernizes a Multilevel Workplace in Midtown for a Financial Firm

Mid-century office towers are fixtures of the New York skyline. From the MetLife Building to Black Rock, they make up much of the commercial real estate in Midtown but are woefully out of date and ripe for demolition. (Even Skidmore, Owings & Merrill’s 270 Park Avenue has met the wrecking ball.) Low ceilings and large floor plates make for dark interiors, while frequent columns and clunky mechanical systems constrict layouts. Yet for Donnie Morphy, senior director at LSM, these 60-year-old buildings have their charm. “They have great expressions of steel and strong organizational templates,” he says. “There are a lot of things you can’t get rid of, but there’s also a lot you can react to and embrace.” He knows this first-hand. Recently, LSM did just that at the ’60’s office space of a financial firm, creatively updating the interiors so they rival those in any skyscraper of today.

The client engaged LSM to conceive a workplace and a conference center across several levels of an International Style building. The goal was to promote interaction among staffers and give them a light, bright environment—both of which would be difficult given the 50,000- to 100,000-square-foot floor plates. LSM was familiar with the challenges of mid-century structures, having transformed offices in the Seagram Building and Lever House. Led by Interior Design Hall of Fame member Debra Lehman Smith and James McLeish, the firm has shown that with a clever use of material and volume, older buildings can become an asset for clients. “Simplicity is deceptive. Our design for this project embraces the complexity of simplicity,” Lehman Smith says.

LSM conceived a plan that encourages employees to move around, connect, and collaborate. The client envisioned various hubs spread across the office, forcing people to take different routes throughout the day and meet colleagues from other teams. At one such intersection, for instance, a terrace—furnished with Richard Schultz’s 1966 table and chairs—meets a pantry with seating by Space Copenhagen and Foster + Partners. The client also sought circulation at the perimeter, rather than private offices, so employees could have access to natural light and take in views of the city as they walked to get coffee.

Though lined with banded windows, the perimeter could feel cramped, with 8-foot ceilings, baseboard heaters, and steel columns every 20 feet. So LSM covered the columns in mirror, a technique the firm has used in new-builds like 55 Hudson Yards. “The idea was that you could demateri­alize the perimeter and make it feel like a new curtain wall,” Morphy notes. Adds partner Terese Wilson, “It reflected the exterior and the light and made everything feel brighter.” The team also carved out the drywall between the ceiling beams, going to the underside of the slab to gain over 2 feet of height. They brought the same technique to the conference center, heightening the ceiling wherever possible to create more breathing room and add alcoves illuminated by LEDs.

LSM employs such curves throughout to soften the building’s structure and 90-degree angles. Meeting rooms and stairwells are rounded, as are furnishings, like reception’s Charlotte Perriand LC7 chairs, marble-topped coffee table, and long ecru sofa. The conference center’s feature stair widens at the top and bottom to form “an elegant curvature that pulls you up,” Morphy says. It’s one of the many subtle touches that gradually reveal themselves to the visitor. “As you walk through, you see layers of detail that create the whole,” Wilson says. As Manhattan reckons with a glut of empty offices and companies increasingly favor new construction, LSM proves there may be life in these old buildings yet.

LSM: james mcleish; mario degisi; mark andre; nathan strieter; nilay akbas; sofia zavala; zibo zhou

fisher marantz stone: lighting consultant

ojb landscape architecture: landscape architect

thornton tomasetti: structural engineer

jb&b: mep

Island architectural woodwork: millwork

mcgrory glass: glasswork

commodore construction: metalwork

unifor: custom furniture workshop

structuretone: general contractor

cassina: chairs (reception)

svend nielsen: custom desk

knoll: benches (reception), side tables (reception, conference center), chairs (meeting room), furniture (terrace)

walters: custom stair (conference center)

stelton: bowls (conference center)

herman miller: chairs (conference room)

Tarkett: carpet (conference room, meeting room)

oluce: lamp (meeting room)

wausau tiles: pavers (terrace)

milliken: carpet (hall)

tile bar: floor tile (pantry)

viccarbe: stools

ultraleather: stool upholstery

campo­longhi: marble supplier

spinneybeck: leather upholstery, paneling

These Task Chairs by Herman Miller and Studio 7.5 Are Anything But Boring

ZGF Architects Rises to the Living Building Challenge With This Office Complex in Portland

It’s a tall claim for only a 5-story structure but ZGF’s PAE Building in Portland, Oregon, is said to be the first developer-driven and largest commercial urban Living Building in the world. Both a speculative office building and headquarters for the engineering firm PAE, it encompasses 58,000 square feet in the city’s historic Old Town/Skidmore district. Assembled by a consortium comprised of Downtown Development Group, Edlen & Co., Walsh Construction Co., and Apex Real Estate Partners, along with PAE and ZGF, the building was designed to last 500 years. Another tall claim. We couldn’t help but examine it with ZGF associate principal and project architect, Michael O’Mara. 

Though completed in October 2021 following more than a four-year process, the building from the outside looks as if it could have been standing for decades so in tune is it with the scale and industrial nature of the neighborhood. “We took inspiration from the district, Portland’s only national historic district and one of two in Oregon,” O’Mara launches his explanation. Ergo, the structure’s Italianate style constructed with the brick, steel, heavy timber, and glass endemic to the Pacific Northwest. Spatial allotments have retail, mechanicals, storage for 45 bikes, and showers at ground with PAE’s 33,000 square feet of offices taking over floors three to five. “PAE is an active group, and they do a lot of walking meetings,” the architect notes adding that proximity to the Willamette River front was indeed a factor in site selection. The second floor created with core and shell design for two tenants already has one, Beneficial State Bank. 

Interiors with were particularly challenging. They adhered to the Living Building Challenge’s seven main components, aka petals: place, water, energy, materials, health and happiness, equity, and beauty. For starters that meant “no Red List materials,” O’Mara continues. “Nothing harmful to humans.” So ZGF’s “overarching goal was to limit materials.” The simple pervasive palette is composed of radiant heated and cooled concrete slab for flooring, cross laminated timber for ceilings, glulam columns and beams. Beyond that, ZGF used wool textiles, felt for ceiling baffles where needed, and wood, often salvaged, for casework. Plastic laminates were off limits. At 13 ½ feet high, floors have operable windows at 70% of the perimeter for ventilation and ample daylight. No doubt a healthy situation invoking happiness as well.  

As for water and energy, the PAE Living Building is self-sufficient. Captured rainwater, stored in a 71,000-gallon cistern meets its needs. Meanwhile a photovoltaic roof not only creates a net positive energy situation but connection to the city grid enables the structure to give back. 

How to quantify beauty? Filling in a former parking lot with this new development is one way. Another is to take a look at the PAE quarters. It’s third-floor reception is introduced with a mural, painted in warm tones by Portlandian Jess Brinkerhoff. The facing red maple desk is an attractive example of wood re-purposed from trees felled on site. It’s crafted by Nick Collins, a ZGF designer and quasi professional woodworker who also created the area’s slatted screen wall and paneled partition of vertical grain fir. Meanwhile the connecting stair with its enlarged opening encourages vertical circulation in lieu of elevators, and a cool lighting system changes the color of the stairwell’s back wall the more people use the steps. Nearby, a library whose multi-chrome striped rug and teal-upholstered seating fits the beauty bill while addressing the LBC initiative of re-using furniture. 

The piece de resistance, however, comes on the fifth floor. Encompassing 1,500 square feet at the southeast corner, the area is called the “deckony” and is ZGF’s answer to a roof deck, the real thing precluded by PV panels for one and Portland’s weather another. With two walls of workable windows, it’s like an open-air lounge that’s the social hub of the building. Fully fit out for AV capability, it’s also a draw for both PAE events and those of the community’s architecture, engineering, and construction industry. 

Even pre-COVID, PAE’s workforce operated on a hybrid basis. Folks are continuing the practice at open stations on a hoteling basis for maximum flexibility. Overall, the site is designed for 200.  

Back at ground, the building’s centrally placed entrance speaks of beauty, place, and even the intangible notion of equity. Its carved medallion wall sculpture is a commissioned piece by Toma Villa, a member of the local Yakama Nation. Thematically, it alludes to the winds blowing through the Columbia River Gorge, part of his Native story line, as well as the role of wind in renewable energy, which is so vital today. 

LBC certification requires a year of performance evaluation. Come summer 2023, the PAE Living Building expects full accreditation.

Jones Haydu and Evans Design Studio Employ a Sustainable Strategy for this San Francisco Office

Even though its name is Inclusive Capital Partners, the firm is somewhat of an outlier in the investment community. First, it lays claim to environmentally-friendly investing, not only in terms of locating companies for its own portfolio but in having its partners achieve board membership when possible. Second, its headquarters is in an erstwhile warehouse within San Francisco’s Presidio, the 1,500-acre national park protected under landmark status. That posed constraints for first-time collaborators Amber Evans of her eponymous design studio and Jones Haydu. Regardless, the striking results are both rustic and refined. 

Evans was the catalyst. “I knew George Hamel, the founder and managing partner, before he branched off from ValueAct Capital for a more sustainable approach,” she begins. But at 12,167 square feet, the project was more than she alone could handle.  “I always wanted to work with Paul and Hulett,” so timing was propitious for this first-time collaboration.

“We worked as an all-inclusive team, operating as a single studio with the benefit of Amber as an additional designer,” Jones jumps in vis-à-vis process. “We came up with four or five schemes then whittled them down to two.” Of constraints, he says, “they take landmark status seriously.” That meant retaining some existing conditions while ascertaining that subsequent interventions “don’t mimic history but are clearly seen as new.” 

The envelope with its oak flooring, beams, and bow-truss structure was kept intact as were the eight added skylights bringing light into what had been a dim interior. Then, came a straightforward layout. “We worked with the notion of letting the space be what it is,” Jones continues. That meant enclosed offices, much the norm for an investment firm, at the perimeter with a continuous pale wooden cap and darker wood columns framing their glass-fronted enclosures. Occupying the 100-foot-long central spine is the boardroom with two points of entry and acoustic wood material surrounding a massive marble table for 16 that is ringed by leather chairs and overlooked by a Vincent van Duysen lighting fixture for Flos. A pair of conference rooms and workstations, too, populate the area as does the reception desk of blackened steel plates and Venetian plaster. Overall, the vibe is undeniably modern, but with a nod to “imagery of old-growth redwood trees, an important visual touchstone for ICP,” Jones notes. Evans adds: “The clients had worked with a branding firm for identity and came up with the idea of the Hyperion redwood.”

Abstracted, the massive tree takes form as an extraordinary weathering steel sculpture standing behind the reception desk. Designed by the team and fabricated by Joe Chambers, a local, it stands 15 feet tall and is composed of 36 thin plates held together by internal magnets and assembled on site. Though not as heavy as a Richard Serra piece, it nevertheless weighs in at more than 4,500 pounds and required reinforcing of floor joists below. Notes Evans: “It was a great way to have an interactive design charette.” Jones reinforces that collaboration, complimenting it as “ego-less design.” Haydu concurs: “Good ideas were generated from fruitful interactions.” 

Aidlin Darling Design and Susan Marinello Interiors Team Up on This Modern Office in Seattle

2022 Best of Year Winner for Small Tech Office

For Expedia Group, travel is a way of life. When the tech company, which includes Expedia.com along with Vrbo, Orbitz, Travelocity, and hundreds more travel aggregator sites, took over a 40-acre waterfront campus along Seattle’s Elliott Bay in 2015, a central aim was to help employees experience the physical and mental benefits of travel, without leaving the office. “With all the acreage in hand, our goal was to create a destination on the grounds—sort of an on-site ‘offsite,’” Expedia’s director of real estate Josh Khanna says. In 2017, Aidlin Darling Design, known for their intimately crafted residences and commercial interiors, won the bid to create a new sheltered on-campus environment for staff to work and gather but also retreat.

Called the Prow, the single-story, 3,700-square-foot building is a deliberate departure from the multistory steel, glass, and concrete structures of the main campus. “Expedia’s leadership group was in tune with creating a full-body, sensorial workplace,” begins Joshua Aidlin, principal and cofounder, with David Darling, of ADD. “The ethos of Seattle is outdoor-focused and athletic, and Expedia embraced that.” The common end for this ancillary structure was a biophilic sanctuary that celebrates the landscape in both form and function.

Nestled into the southernmost edge of campus closest to the waterfront, the Prow is sited several hundred feet from Expedia’s primary work spaces. In contrast to the slick industrial language of those buildings, the volume emphasizes natural materials like stone and wood, helping it knit into the surroundings. “We didn’t want to block the view of the bay from the offices, so we needed to create a structure that was hidden in plain sight,” Aidlin explains. For his team, which was co-led by senior associate Adam Rouse, the solution was a building that is of the landscape in every sense.

Appearing to grow from the earth, the Prow’s stone-formed walls angle down into the ground plane to connect seamlessly with the existing riprap-stone walls delineating the campus border. It gracefully merges into the ziggurat-shape grass terraces defining this portion of the grounds, part of a larger campus master plan by Surfacedesign. Indigenous grasses planted here continue uninterrupted along the roof of the Prow. “It’s meant to be a diamond in the rough—intentionally organic, intentionally hidden,” Aidlin notes. “There’s an element of discovery because it presents as a landscape rather than a building.”

indoor-outdoor spaces encourage exploration in Expedia Group’s modern office

Expedians who make the open-air trek to the Prow—often braving the ubiquitous Pacific Northwest rain—are rewarded with a cozy hideaway that feels more woodland cabin than workplace. That’s thanks to president and principal design director Susan Marinello and senior design associate Louisa Chang of Susan Marinello Interiors, which evoked a relaxed, residential environment where employees can enjoy a moment of quiet contemplation in softly upholstered furnishings aside a glowing fireplace. “Expedia offers a window to the world, so our concept reflects those collective travel experiences by curating items from across the globe,” Marinello says of the many art-inspired furnishings, crafted by makers from locales as far flung as India and Brazil. The showstopper is the 20-person conference table, which contains no screws and was custom-built from a pair of book-matched black walnut slabs by George Nakashima Woodworkers, the company founded by the famed late Seattle furniture designer. Employees can reserve the table for larger meetings away from the hustle and bustle of the main office. (The Prow also accommodates events with a catering kitchen tucked into a corner.)

A set of sliding panels in a floor-to-ceiling glass wall opens to the outdoors, allowing those meetings to spill out to an elevated deck with views of Mount Rainier in the distance and bikes and Segways zooming by on the Elliott Bay Trail below. Since the building fronts a city park and is visible from boats in the water, ADD considered its appearance from all directions. “The building takes the landscape and covers itself with it like a blanket, while presenting a crystalline-inspired window to the public,” Rouse says.

The Prow is a study in contrasts, with the grounded, stone walls and green roof nestling into the earth just as it appears to take flight at the opposite end. There, the sharply pointed roof that cantilevers out 50 feet lifts off above the deck, taking the form of an airplane wing or, as the building’s namesake suggests, a ship’s bow. “The site experiences so many modes of transportation: trains, planes, automobiles, scooters, bikes, boats, so the structure is meant to inspire the concept of motion and flight,” says Aidlin, referencing the travel-centric ethos of Expedia.

Ultimately, this notion of grounded aspiration informs how this unconventional office space shifts the mindset of Expedians, breaking up routines and inspiring new forms of interaction. “They have to go out into nature and experience the elements to access the Prow,” Chang says. “It physically and emotionally transports them.” At a moment when the world is returning to the office, the project signals a new mode of workplace connection that’s taking flight.

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a closer look at the design details throughout

Aidlin Darling Design: david darling, faia; ryan hughes; luis sabatar musa; laing chung; kent chiang; tony schonhardt

Susan Marinello Interiors: dena mammano

ZGF: Campus Architect

surfacedesign: landscape architect

fisher marantz stone: lighting consultant

KPFF: structural engineer, civil engineer

wsp: MEP

js perrott: woodwork, stonework

gly construction: general contractor

george nakashima woodworkers: custom table (conference area)

vaughan benz: custom chairs

Maharam: chair fabric

advanced ironworks: custom fence (entry)

driscoll robbins fine carpets: rug (lounge)

Holly Hunt: sectional

misia paris; zak + fox: sectional fabrics

thayer coggin: chairs

douglass leather: chair upholstery

DeMuro Das: bench

dan pollock: custom table

uchytil’s custom woodworking: custom console

alessandra delgado design: lamps (lounge, reading area)

daltile: tile (rest­room)

zurn: toilet

rockwood: door pull

Janus et Cie: table (deck)

triconfort: chairs

meyer wells: stools

ak47 design: firepit

montigo: fireplace (reading area)

a. rudin: chair

bernhardt textiles: chair fabric

creoworks: custom ceiling system

brandsen floors: flooring

lucifer lighting company; luminii: lighting

Arcadia: storefront windows

phoenix panels: exterior metal paneling

hartung: glazing

columbia green technologies: green roof system

benjamin moore & co.: paint

Random Studio Links Up with X+L for an Amsterdam Office That’s All About Connections

Tasked with creating synergy between a company’s digital culture and physical surroundings, Amsterdam’s Random Studio transformed a mostly-raw 11,800-square-foot space into a new headquarters for some 50 employees. With some help from local firm X+L, they seamlessly integrated the old and new.

Traditional techniques—concrete planters for trees in the open studio space, a 3,300-square-foot roof garden—mix with the latest in sustainable innovation, from walls made of sound-absorbing recycled newspaper to electrical heat pumps that eliminate the building’s need for gas entirely. 

More futuristic features complete the project. An interconnected technical infrastructure manages the lighting, temperature, and interfaces for the studio’s digital art and design projects. A site-specific light installation by artist Arnout Meijer projects exterior light conditions onto the ceiling and rear wall. “It runs a virtual sky simulation based on the local latitude/longitude, date, and time to create an accurate representation of a local sky,” says Daan Lucas, founder and managing director of Random Studio.

“It also interfaces with a weather API to drive a dynamic cloud simulation,” Lucas shares. “The colors of the virtual sky change throughout the day and year.” This means the team is graced with a midday sunset and subsequent sunrise as the light shifts from hues of yellow to deeper oranges to reds. “The end of the week is signified with an early and very drawn-out virtual sunset,” he adds. Call it a Sunset Friday.