Inside Look: Dune CEO’s Southampton Home by Sawyer|Berson

Over the past few decades, the New York architecture firm Sawyer|Berson has designed a bevy of houses in the Hamptons. Admired for their stylistic versatility, founding partners Brian Sawyer and John Berson have masterminded everything from stately Colonial Revival residences to bold, contemporary compounds. But never before had the studio worked on a home quite like the one proposed by Richard Shemtov for a wooded single-acre property in Southampton.

Shemtov, the CEO and founder of furniture company Dune, was looking to build a weekend retreat to share with his wife, Dominique, and their three daughters, who range in age from 14 to 26. He envisioned something modestly scaled, modeled after traditional gable-roof barns but in a rigorously pared-down style. Key inspirations were Herzog & de Meuron’s Parrish Art Museum in nearby Water Mill and the Baron House in Sweden by John Pawson.

“It wasn’t our typical commission,” says Sawyer, who has known and worked with Shemtov for years. “It was an exercise in discipline, really, a fun puzzle to work out. We could fit a certain amount of program in the box.” Adds Berson, “As it turned out, that was a deceptively simple idea, to coordinate the plan and section and make the entire composition sing.”

A Southampton Home Three Years in the Making

To create a crisp silhouette, Sawyer and Berson sunk one of the structure’s two main levels entirely below-grade and devised the standing-seam roof, a weathered-gray zinc, so that it is flush with the perimeter edges and has hidden gutters. Expanses of 10-foot-high, black-painted aluminum–framed glass—most of which slide open—line much of the front and rear facades, while the rest of the exterior is clad in a distinctive recycled-glass brick.

The house’s ground floor encompasses an open living/dining area, the kitchen, and four bedrooms. The loftlike basement level—housing several entertaining areas, Shemtov’s home office, a laundry room, a gym, and a kitchenette—is completely column-free, which added significantly to the engineering complexity of the project. The house also expanded a bit as plans developed: A custom-fabricated carport was tacked on and room was carved out below the eaves to create a half level, a cozy attic den that can double as a guest bedroom. “It’s the house we wanted,” Shemtov says. “But we went way over budget and it took nearly three years to build.”

Interiors are by Homeowner Richard Shemtov

A big chunk of that time was devoted to fitting out the 8,000-square-foot interiors. It’s not uncommon for Sawyer|Berson to handle every aspect of a project—architecture, interiors, landscape—as can be seen in the duo’s forthcoming monograph, to be published by Rizzoli this fall in advance of the firm’s 25th anniversary. But in this case Shemtov oversaw the interiors himself, his first time designing a project of this scale. “Every inch of the house was considered and thought out, almost to the point where it was obsessive,” he admits.

A Courtyard Garden by Sawyer|Berson Brightens the Lower Level

The art is mostly things the homeowners have collected over years, works by friends or that have a personal resonance. One new acquisition is the Bernardo Siciliano painting of a restaurant interior that hangs in the dining area. The scene felt distinctly familiar to Shemtov, who learned after he bought it that the artist had based it on Lincoln, a restaurant in Lincoln Center where Dune created a custom banquette.

To bring light down into the lower level, Sawyer|Berson, which oversaw landscaping, created a courtyard garden with a series of amphitheater-style concrete terraces that are arrayed with a profusion of potted plants. “I originally saw it as a kind of hanging garden with things tumbling down,” says Sawyer. “Richard came up with the idea of lining it with pots, which I think is fun and punchy.”

The focal point of the rear grounds is a minimalist swimming pool, surrounded by porcelain-tile coping and a sweep of precisely graded lawn. There’s an outdoor kitchen and a poolside dining pergola, as well as a covered terrace that’s become one of the family’s favorite hangout spots. Shemtov imagines spending weekends and summers here with the girls—and, eventually, their families—for many years to come. “Labor of love is a commonly used term,” he says, “but with this house, it resonates a lot.”

Inside a Southampton Home by Sawyer|Berson 

sawyer|berson: alex taylor wilk

blue sky design: structural engineer

bk kuck construction: general contractor

toulemonde bochart: rug (lounge)

normann copenhagen: small side table

romo: chair fabric (lounge), drapery sheers (living area, dining area), banquette fabric (mudroom), bench fabric, window-treatment fabric (guest bedroom), settee fabric (main bedroom)

anna karlin: pendant fixture (dining area)

élitis: chair fabric

crosby street studios: rugs (dining area, guest bedroom)

schmitt design: chandelier (living area)

pollack: sectional fabric

kerry joyce: chair fabric

through jeff lincoln art & design: cocktail table, side tables

Ortal: fireplace

foro marble: fireplace stone

stone source: floor tile (mudroom)

renson: custom carport, custom pergola (exterior)

damien hirst: wallpaper (bedroom)

art + loom: rug

Knoll Textiles: wall fabric

robert allen: headboard fabric

brinklicht: pendant fix­tures (kitchen)

corian: countertops

piet boon: stools

wolf: oven

California Faucets: sink fittings

through lee jofa: drapery fabric (main bedroom)

c & c milano: bed fabric

céline wright: pendant fixture

beadlight: sconces

jab: chair fabric, ottoman fabric (main bedroom), chair fabric (game area)

mgs milano: outdoor shower (guest bedroom)

pelican pools: pool (terrace)

ceramiche refin: pavers

lindsay cowles: wallpaper (bedroom)

paul smith: lamp

loro piana: chair fabric

verzelloni: bench

jane churchill: bench fabric

modernica: screens (game area)

Moooi: pendant fixture

salvatori: wall tile (bathroom)

concrete collaborative: countertop stone

ann sacks: floor tile

brizo: sink fittings

&tradition: lamp (den)

fleetwood windows & doors: windows, exterior doors

rheinzink: roof

harbour outdoor: outdoor furniture

Stonhard: resin floor coating

benjamin moore & co.: paint

Gensler Enlivens the Street-Level of Chicago’s Willis Tower

At 1,451 feet, the Sears Tower was the tallest building in the world when it opened in Chicago in 1973. Designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, it rises 110 stories over the Loop neighborhood and is a modernist icon, with a geometric structure and a facade of blackened aluminum and bronze-tinted glass. It’s also a landmark visible from across the city—so much so that locals still call it the Sears Tower, though it was renamed the Willis Tower in 2009. But it was always, as architecture critic Blair Kamin put it, “a dud at street level.” An austere plaza and a granite berm wrapping the base kept pedestrians at bay, and the public could only enter to visit Skydeck, the observation platform. In 2015, Blackstone bought the building and hired Gensler to rethink the site, which has resulted in a mixed-use attraction for office workers, tourists, and Chicagoans alike.

Todd Heiser, principal and managing director at Gensler’s Chicago studio, grew up in the city and found it surreal to take on the high-profile project. “It’s walking on hallowed ground,” he begins. “We approached it with humility, serving to amplify its positives and correct what was imperfect.” Willis Tower, he notes, was the product of an era of urban flight and single-use office buildings; it was designed to be impenetrable. But in the 21st century, aside from the early years of the COVID pandemic, cities have come roaring back to life and tenants seek dynamic, welcoming workplaces.

Designing an Amenities-Rich Hub in the Willis Tower

Gensler brought the supertall up to date with a 463,000-square-foot makeover, including new entrances, lounges, and a transparent six-story podium with a food hall and a rooftop park—elements that prove why the firm not only ranks number one among the Interior Design Top 100 Giants but also third amid the Hospitality Giants (as well as 14th on the Healthcare list).

Heiser and Hansoo Kim, principal and design director at Gensler’s Washington office, started by researching how people used and moved through the building. They met with families visiting the Skydeck, who were often also looking for a place to have lunch, and office workers hoping to get to their desks quickly. “We had to support demographics of all ages,” Heiser says, and consider “the person who wanted to linger and the person who wanted a friction-free environment.” Kim adds that to create a vibrant multipurpose destination, they had to connect different types of programming, like coworking and retail, and “blur the boundaries between work, life, and play,” he notes.

Gensler Creates an Expansive Communal Space for All Ages

The block-long building has entrances on three different streets (Wacker, Jackson, and Franklin). Originally, there were two for tenants and one for Skydeck visitors. Gensler opened them all to the public. “The entire base of the tower is now porous,” Heiser continues. Like a transportation hub or civic plaza, it hosts everyone from United Airlines employees who work in the building to toddlers and Midwestern retirees; the Skydeck alone draws 1.7 million visitors a year. Security is discreet. There are guards and cameras, but nothing like the airport-style measures we’ve come to expect in skyscrapers since 9/11. Touchless turnstiles use fingerprint scanners to admit employees into the tenant elevator bank at the building core.

Gensler built the glass-walled podium on what had been an unwelcoming granite plaza, extending the base of the building to the sidewalk. The centerpiece of the addition is a soaring atrium and food hall called Catalog, a nod to the Sears mail-order business, that brings together local eateries beneath an enormous skylight. Diners can slide onto oak benches under bistro-style lights and look up at the tower. “Our goal was to create a Chicago streetscape inside the atrium, so you feel like you’re outside,” Kim explains. Above Catalog, a public roof garden with winding paths and native prairie grasses faces a neighboring park. Like the rest of the podium, it connects the building to the street and draws pedestrians into the once-forbidding landmark.

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Inside the Spacious Street-Level of the Willis Tower

Gensler: grant uhlir; benjy ward; michael townsend; neale scotty; scott marker; stephen katz; hua-jun cao; kelly bogenschutz; marissa luehring; shawn fawell; todd desmarais; jeffrey peck; kim lindstrom; kate pedriani

skb architects: facade architect

olin: landscape architect

thornton tomasetti: structural engineer

esd: mep

v3 companies: civil engineer

burlington stone; campolonghi: stonework

parenti & raffaelli: millwork

clayco corp.; turner construction co.: general contractors

cascade coil drapery: chain drapery (lounge)

bloomsburg carpet: rug

pk-30 system: backlit wall

B&B Italia: sofa

cassina: black, white coffee tables

phantom hands: green chairs

novum structures: skylight (food hall)

tegan lighting: catenary system

concrete collaborative: flooring

newmat: stretched ceiling (lounge)

Avenue Road: green barrel chairs

hanover archi­tectural products: pavers (roof)

rich brilliant willing: pendant fixtures (food hall)

arflex: teal chairs

established & sons: stools

tacchini: sofa (small lounge)

estudio persona: chairs

stahl + band: coffee table

Pulpo: side table

linetec: custom aluminum cladding

boston valley terra cotta: terra-cotta paneling

A Standout Gym Entices Employees Back to This Los Angeles Office

Design a post-pandemic workplace. That was architect Kristi Paulson’s first assignment for a confidential client when she landed at Behnisch Architekten. Fortunately for the client—and Behnisch—Paulson had already worked for the firm, when it had a previous L.A. studio from 1999 to 2011 (she was there from 2007 to 2011 as project partner). After a seven-year run at ZGF, she’s returned as partner-in-charge, her duties, in addition to designing the aforementioned workplace, also encompassing putting together a team and heading up the new L.A. operation with majority ownership—making the studio a woman-owned business.

The endeavor also marks Paulson’s first copiloting expedition with her husband, Behnisch director Daniel Poei. Further worth noting is when the client’s workplace project began: January 2020. Talk about timing. The confluence of the COVID-19 shutdown, working remotely, and a tight schedule from the client conveyed an unprecedented urgency. It meant two years of quasi 24/7 dedication. “We lived and breathed this project,” Paulson recalls. Fortunately again, the couple’s commitment and joint four decades of design experience is clearly evident in the end result: a bright four-story office that focuses on employee connectivity to each other and nature.

Design Considerations for This Post-Pandemic Workplace Centered on Collaboration and Wellness

The process began with the client introducing Paulson and Poei to its 110,000-square-foot “developer box,” Paulson notes, with a central elevator lobby. “Luckily, the owner opened the door for us to communicate directly with the sub-contractors, not just the contractors,” Poei says. “So we could get to the right people and figure things out.”

For the client’s small, low-density workforce valuing connection and operating on egalitarian premises, the Behnisch team’s first step entailed translating said connection to physical reality. Irregular cuts piercing three of the floor plates were means to that end, while simultaneously creating “an eccentrically shaped atrium on either side of the elevator lobby,” Paulson says. The resulting new territory sports “a diversity of spatial environments and visual connections between levels.” Moving up and down between them was crucial to collaborative success. She and Poei provided plenty of stunning options—make that eight of them. Four cantilevered, hairpin-turn staircases, a pair for each of the two atriums, connect the upper three levels, designated as office areas. Beyond, four spiral staircases, counter­acting the building’s rectangularity and its orthogonal layout, are two-story connectors. All are similarly constructed of matte black–painted steel cladding and white oak veneer for risers, treads, and inner balustrade paneling.

The Office Gym Features a 15-Foot-High Climbing Wall

As striking as the stairs are, there’s another showstopper standing front and center on the ground floor. A 10,000-square- foot gym adjoining reception is fully out in the open, not secreted away as is often the case. Outfitted with weight and cardio apparatus, it offers a plethora of choices for staffers. But their real challenge comes at the 15-foot-high bouldering wall, conceived to wrap around and conceal some of the existing building core elements. “Many of the buildings Behnisch designs worldwide have ground-floor amenities for connectivity. We think globally and share knowledge,” Paulson says, referring to projects by the firm’s other offices in Boston, Stuttgart, Munich, and Weimar. “Here, the client even provides its employees with free bouldering shoes.”

The Space Nods to Company Values With Custom Art Pieces 

Given Behnisch’s global reach, Paulson’s art program for the client, themed to geography, was a natural—literally and figuratively. Six continents, mapped out as massive oak wall sculptures, unfold two per floor across the office levels. Antarctica, the seventh, is on the ground floor. Meanwhile, conference rooms are named after rivers, like the Amazon, signifying movement and the flow of discussion, with cut-vinyl graphics for signage. The earthy theme continues with open lounge areas named after lakes to connote serenity. Which is, after all, an important vibe when venturing back to the office.

behnisch architekten: tony gonzalez; vera tian; laura fox; erik hegre; apurva ravi; victoria oakes

ockert und partner: graphics consultant

loisos + ubbelohde: lighting consultant

spmdesign: art consultant

john a. martin and associates: structural engineer

acco engineered systems: mechanical, plumbing contractor

morrow meadows: electrical contractor

spooner’s woodworks: millwork

washington iron works: metalwork

dpr construction: general contractor

diamond perforated metals: staircase panels (atrium)

california sheet metal: staircase soffits

Dinesen: wood flooring

stone source: stone flooring

Gubi: coffee tables (break-out areas, atrium)

knoll: chairs (break-out areas, lounge)

caesarstone: sectional tabletops (break-out areas)

spinneybeck: sectional leather

unisource solutions: custom sectionals (break-out areas, gym), parson’s table (meeting area), coffee table (lounge), benches (gym), table (conference room)

krc rock: custom rock bed (lounge)

sistemalux: pendant fixtures

Arup: Consultant for Fire/Life Safety, Acoustics and Audio Visual

blå station: chairs (lounge), sectionals (conference room), sofas (break-out area)

sorensen: chair upholstery (lounge), sectional upholstery (conference room)

Fritz Hansen: chairs (atrium)

walltopia: climbing wall panels (gym)

climbmat: mat

beta-calco: spotlights

mondo: floor­ing

carl hansen & søn: chairs (break-out area)

kvadrat: sofa fabric

leland: stools (meeting area, cafeteria)

eureka: pendant fixtures

daltile: wall tile (cafeteria)

concrete collaborative: flooring

Dupont: tabletop material

west coast industries: table bases

flor: carpet tile

Maharam: wall panels

conwed: wall system

schüco: glazing system

vibia: flush-mount fixtures

lumenpulse: downlights

CertainTeed: suspend ceiling grids

assa abloy: door pulls

guardian glass: glass

vista point: paint

Fogarty Finger Charts a New Course in the Brooklyn Navy Yard With Dock 72

Across the East River from the Lower East Side, the Brooklyn-side shoreline zigzags inward to form Wallabout Bay. This funky stretch of waterfront, once home to Lenape tribespeople and early Dutch settlers, began its modern life as an innovation hub in 1801, when President Adams designated it one of the country’s first Navy yards; during its World War II heyday, it operated six dry docks and employed 70,000 workers. More recently, the since-decommissioned site has been reborn as a hotbed of tech companies and creatives, the home address of healthcare incubators, furniture startups, small-batch juice purveyors, cutting-edge military-gear makers, film sound stages, and the country’s largest rooftop soil farm.

Until now, the majority of redevelopment in the Brooklyn Navy Yard has entailed adaptive reuse of its industrial warehouses. Enter Dock 72, the first ground-up commercial office building to be erected right on the waterfront (and, in fact, one of the largest such structures to be built in the city’s outer boroughs in many decades). The 16-story volume, with base building design by S9 Architecture, sits prowlike on a skinny pier sandwiched between two former dry docks and culminating in a new ferry terminal. In 2015, as construction documents were being drawn up, codevelopers Boston Properties and Rudin Management tapped Fogarty Finger to start conceptualizing interior architecture—from FF&E to art curation—for the entry-level lobby and commissary, second-floor fitness center, and penthouse-level conference center, totaling some 60,000 square feet of amenities. WeWork had already signed on as anchor tenant and the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation was naturally involved, too, meaning there were many stakeholders to please—and to align. “Those many players had so many different opinions, which is so New York, right?” says Fogarty Finger director Alexandra Cuber, who led the project with associate director Candace Rimes. “From that delightfully tangled knot of ideas and individual preferences, we had to come up with a strong concept that had enough nuance and depth that everyone could see themselves in it and find a piece they’d contributed to.”

Ultimately, the design team sought to channel both the can-do spirit of the 300-acre industrial park and what Cuber calls its “nautical messaging”: the unique sun-bleached, rust-tinged palette and omnipresent visual language of ship details and graphics. As a guiding narrative, she and Rimes homed in on the Plimsoll Line, a technical symbol on every ship’s hull that denotes the proper immersion level given its load and the density of the water it’s traveling through. FF commissioned a rendering of Plimsoll markings in yellow neon, which now glows beaconlike at the Dock 72 entry—setting the stage for the subsequent journey.

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It’s quite a journey indeed from the front door to reception at the far end of the building, accessed via a 170-foot-long corridor with a glass wall directing eyeballs to the active adjacent dock. “To make that lengthy pathway an enjoyable process required breaking it up into ‘rooms’ that could be occupied and experienced,” Cuber explains. Changes in ancillary seating (from low- to high-back) and flooring (dark- to light-gray terrazzo) demarcate a series of vignettes along this promenade. So do blackened-steel screens and portals that cast a spirited shadow play and reflect the linearity of ship cables, sails, and razzle-dazzle camouflage.

In addition to subdividing space, the steel portals also frame wall murals by area artists who were given free rein to devise compositions that spoke to the context, but assigned a specific color palette reflecting a different type of water from the Plimsoll Line. Bryce Wymer’s depiction of ship-wrangling in a tropical storm pays homage to women who worked in the yard during wartime; an abstract color field by Kristin Texeira, who has a studio in the complex, is painted in summer-water hues.

The murals reflect another guiding principal of the project: a commitment to
locally made design. All art and much of the custom furniture were produced in or near the Navy Yard. “We were passionate about finding the right partners and a diverse group of collaborators,” Rimes notes. “It pushed us to go the extra mile: We walked all around Crown Heights, Bushwick, Greenpoint, and throughout the Navy Yard to find who can make what or submit an idea.”

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Amenities feature a veritable roll call—er, ship’s manifest—of Big Apple talent. For the ground-floor café, Concrete Collaborative crafted tiles in custom colorways derived from photographs of the yard. Dan Funderburgh contributed a lobby mural as well as a nautical-print wallpaper for the second-floor lounge and juice bar. IceStone fabricated recycled-glass table bases in the lobby. And elevator cabs function as intimate viewing rooms for large-scale Navy Yard photographs by Harrison Boyce.

The 16th-floor conference center, with a subdividable 200-capacity town hall space, plus various lounge and meeting areas, is no exception to the city-made mandate, with shapely mirrors by Bower Studios and stacked-stone tables by Souda. What’s different up here is a shift in vibe and materiality, from the pre­dominant white-oak millwork of the lower levels to warmer walnut tones and a darker palette. “The colors become saturated and inky, as if they’ve been soaked in water,” Rimes says. “It’s like being on the deck of a vintage yacht.” A perfect launching point for next-gen captains of industry.

Fogarty Finger: robert finger; tin min fong; garrett rock; allie mathison; taylor fleming; evita fanou; jacob laskowski; carl laffan; chris worton

perkins eastman: Architect of Record:

one lux studio: lighting consultant

let there be neon: custom graphics

ove aruo & partners: structural engineer

cosentini associates: mep

langan: civil engineer

armada; capitol woodwork; zsd: woodwork

argosy designs; gkd metal fabrics: metalwork

concrete works east: concrete work

gilbane; hunter roberts: general contractors

lampiste: custom dome fixtures (lobby)

andrew nyer: pendant globes (hall, café)

oluce: table lamp (hall)

hbf: tripod tables

Maharam: Bench fabric (hall), banquette fabric (meeting room)

filzfelt: felt (elevator lobby)

Hay: chairs (hall, café). la cividina: white tables, wire tables (hall)

johanson: stools

ananda: flooring (studio)

normann copen­hagen: chairs (meeting room)

bower studios: mirror

souda: table (meeting room), side table (lounge)

velis: cab (elevator)

lf illuminations: cylinder fixtures (reception)

acolyte: pendant fixtures

clé tile: floor tile (bar)

brendan ravenhill studio: pendant fix­tures

Stellar Works: stools

milliken: carpet tile (lounge)

sattler: pendant rings

arper: chairs, sofas, ottomans

garsnas: barrel chairs

light originals: pendant fix­tures

gotham lighting: can fixtures

missana: chairs (hall)

concrete collaborative: floor tile (café)

zonca terrazzo: terrazzo flooring

hudson company: wood floor­ing

ceilings plus: custom slat ceilings

trespa: paneling

tagwall: storefront systems

Rapt Studio Employs an Outdoorsy-tech Aesthetic for VF Corporation’s Headquarters in Denver

VF Corporation has come a long way since its founding as a maker of gloves and lingerie. Once named Vanity Fair, the 120-year-old company has ditched the intimates line, built a portfolio of 13 outdoor and apparel brands, and made it a mission to promote active, sustainable lifestyles. Most recently, VF re­located executive headquarters from Greensboro, North Carolina, to Denver, where it shares a 10-story downtown high-rise with five of its previously dispersed brands: The North Face, JanSport, Altra, Icebreaker, and Smartwool. For this major strategic move, VF called on a trusted partner, Rapt Studio, to conceive a vertical campus that fosters intramural collaboration.

Rapt has worked with VF since 2000, creating offices first for The North Face in San Leandro, California, and then for several other labels. That history was important for the Denver project because it required “empathy for each of the brands,” says Rapt CEO and chief creative officer David Galullo, who led the project with design director Mike Dubitsky. Sharing a roof with the parent company “was like a teenager being asked to move back home. We could stand strong and say, This is how the brand needs to identify itself.” Rapt’s challenge was to design a workplace that reflected the ethos of VF as well as the character of its subsidiaries, which make everything from ergonomic footwear (Altra) and merino socks (Smartwool) to backpacks (JanSport) and outdoor gear (The North Face).

Taking on the project in 2018, Rapt began with spatial organization, making stacking diagrams and considering how employees would move through the 285,000-square-foot building. The team researched the work habits of different departments and what they needed to be productive, like material libraries for product designers. “Our discovery dives deep into the personality of groups and how they fit into the purpose of an organization,” Galullo explains. “We focus on how a company supports its workforce.” He believes that strategy made Rapt’s concept for VF resilient when the pandemic hit during the construction phase. So far, layouts are unchanged; desks were always well-spaced. Though most of the 1,200 employees at VF Denver are still remote, the 300 or so who have trickled in this summer have ample room for social distancing.

Each brand has its own office, lounge, and tinker zone. On floors four to seven, The North Face has the largest footprint, with a communicating stair and maker spaces at each landing; Smartwool occupies the eighth floor and the other companies share the third. “We worked with each group to develop ways to express their brand that go farther than this month’s advertisement,” Dubitsky remarks. On the Smartwool floor, for example, a local crafts collaborative installed woven yarn pieces on colorful vinyl-covered walls, while The North Face’s corridors are lined with framed drawings of its sponsored athletes (climber Ashima Shiraishi, runner Coree Woltering).

All employees share the double-height lobby and fitness center on the ground floor, a coffee bar on level two, a pair of lounges, and a café with terrace on the fourth. “Our big push was to develop spaces where people from different brands would come together and share best practices,” Galullo says. For the common areas, he and Dubitsky used earthy materials and interactive graphics to channel the company-wide focus on technology and the outdoors. Entering the lobby, staff and visitors encounter a 12-by-20-foot screen displaying nature photography or abstract imagery, boulders serving as benches, and a rammed-earth wall that looks like sedimentary rock. Whether you work for Altra or JanSport, “You feel you belong there,” Galullo observes. “The lobby isn’t heavily identified with one brand, but it’s in sync with all of them.”

Beyond is the fitness center, designed with input from professional rock climber Conrad Anker. It not only has a 26-foot-high climbing wall but also an alpine training center where employees can exercise with oxygen depletion. “A lot of people who work there are avid climbers, so we made sure there wasn’t just some dopey corporate gym,” Galullo continues. Prospective employees get a close-up view of this company culture: The second-floor interview rooms face the climbing wall. “You could be interviewing for a job while someone is climbing 15 feet away,” Dubitsky notes. “It presents a notion of purpose around the company, that it’s a lifestyle.”

The mountaineering theme continues throughout the building. In the elevator, video panels depict scenes from different altitudinal zones as it ascends, from grasslands below to snow at the top. Finishes and materials in the lounges subtly correspond in green, brown, or gray tones; in the ninth-floor leadership office, white-ash flooring and white-oak benches evoke the frosty nival zone. GPS coordinates on painted-steel wayfinding pillars similarly make trekkers feel at home.

Most VF employees will work from home at least until October, and the company expects a mix of in-person and remote going forward. But the office will be vital to its future. As VF chairman, president, and CEO Steve Rendle states, “People are wired to connect with each other, with nature, and with a sense of purpose, and Rapt designed this space to capture that spirit.” After all, there are certain things you can’t do over Zoom—rock climb with colleagues among them.

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Rapt Studio: christine shaw; teresa mcwalters; jack solomon; nick tedesco; ashlynne camuti; yuechen wu; brett su

oz architecture: architect of record

dna associates: digital integration

studio nyl: structural engineer

me engineers: mep

bluestone supply:

concrete collaborative: stonework

edge construction specialties: woodwork

saunders construction: general contractor.

entre-prises: climbing wall (gym)

naughtone: chairs (lobby)

ege: rug

Design Within Reach: side table

stylex: sofas (lobby, penthouse lounge), side tables (penthouse lounge)

Andreu World: chairs (pantry)

Hay: table

rich brilliant willing: sconces

kvadrat: sofa fabric

statements tile and stone: treads, risers (north face stair)

watson: table (tinker zone)

egan: whiteboard

uline: storage units (tinker zone, office area)

sancal: chairs (penthouse lounge)

maars living walls: storefront system

mdc interior solutions: acoustic ceiling systems (lounges)

karndean: floor tile

bernhardt: table (interview room)

luminis: pendant fixtures

geiger: chairs (interview room), workstations

koroseal: cork panels (office area)

earthbuilt: rammed-earth panels

3m: vinyl wallcovering

milliken: carpet tile

terra mai: wood floor planks

alw; intense lighting; lightolier; luminii:

tech lighting: lighting

benjamin moore and co.: paint