City: San Francisco, CA
Year: 2013
Square Footage: 4,200
Team: Primo Orpilla, Denise Cherry, Neil Bartley, Caren Currie, Jeorge Jordan, David Hunter, Liz Guerrero
Services: Schematic Design, Design Development, Interior Graphics, Furniture Coordination, Construction Documents, Project Administration
Photographer: Jasper Sanidad
Designed by Studio O+A, The Giant Pixel Corporation’s small office, located in SF has recently won the 2014 CH+D for Commercial Design (Work). The Giant Pixel Corporation is a small a software-development company located in Mint Plaza that seperates the coders from, well, the rest of us.
Giant Pixel in San Francisco is a software developer occupying three floors near the City’s Mint Plaza, an area known for creative redevelopment and modernity drawn from vintage architecture. With a busy Blue Bottle Coffee shop as neighbor and stylish restaurants just minutes away, Giant Pixel wanted a casual urban look in keeping with its neighborhood. Our design challenge was to fit a variety of distinct work areas into three small footprints—and to do so with both beauty and economy. A laser-cut blackened steel canopy at the entrance to the office begins the exercise with computer code patterns that create a striking visual matrix and divide the front into reception and waiting areas. The custom-fabricated concrete reception desk eschews traditional forms and substitutes a sweeping sculptural elegance offset by the wit of a desk-lamp chandelier. In the basement a lounge and bar provide a cozy in-house retreat for Giant Pixel’s staff and visitors. Upstairs a suspended fireplace and chimney create another arresting focal point evolving into mid-area workstations, a conference room, private break cabanas and finally a coffee counter at the back. Each area is spatially discreet, but each informs the other through proximity, light—and in the case of the fireplace: warmth. Throughout Giant Pixel’s office one design thought prevails: that small spaces may acquire richness through an abundance of uses and careful orchestration of detail.
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