Look! 👀 Gen Z Is Tired of Tech? Her Confession Will Surprise You

0:00Yeah, I completely agree. I think especially when we meet clients for the first time and it might be on Teams, for instance, it's really difficult to get across how passionate you might be. I don't know, it's just like about body language, isn't it? And I feel like it's just so kind of the format is quite rigid, regardless of if you have, you know, different ways you can present on the screen and stuff. I completely agree. It's always better just to meet in person. we've got so many lovely facilities in our office where we can bring in clients and they can have a nice experience with us and i try and push that as much as possible because it's so much better you've got a new office we've got a new office and it's cool is it what's your favorite space oh my favorite space where do i begin there's a few we have a really beautiful design studio it's amazing it's so nice to work in get the samples out everywhere if you have a client come in you can sit there and workshop with them it's really nice and then we also have this beautiful pitch room too um i don't know if it's called that but it feels like it should be it's just really impressive and it gives us all the technology hold i need some training the technology and also just the space to completely show people how their project could look and immerse them in the design but then there's one room that I particularly love because all of Viddy has done such an impressive job of the entire design it's beautiful and there were other designers involved in it as well who are super talented and it's so lovely to walk in every day and see that project um but there's one room that i i don't know just speaks to me personally and it's almost based around music and it has like a cork floor um acoustic panels on the wall but then there's loads of vinyl on the wall and there's a record player and it's it's just so lovely to sit in a meeting and and put the record player on and just kind of have a more kind of chilled space it's really cool I love it but again I'm old school so I really loved the vinyl and record player thought that was like such a nice touch yeah and all of the meeting rooms kind of cater to um the idea that like all the spaces are really flexible so you can choose the space dependent on kind of what you want to show to a client or how you feel that day it's um yeah they've done a brilliant job I love going to work literally it's so nice to go into that office it's cool thinking about that office and like everything like how we're going to like how the world is going to evolve like in 2026 next year wow like so 30 years on from there like what do you think it's going to look like what do you think it's going to be different um what like actually modus office um no not just any office just any office in general what do just said I feel like the digital aspect of um design at the moment is at kind of the forefront of what people do because we're so tech heavy day-to-day on zoom calls on teams calls and that needs to be incorporated into the office um but the thing I'm finding like ever since we've more people are working from home especially and then going into the office on specific days is that those days they really need kind of social meeting spaces a lot more so I'm actually finding when I'm getting a brief that clients don't want loads of working spaces and desks it's primarily kind of social areas and meeting spaces that are at the forefront of a brief because ultimately those days are where people are going in and they're socializing with the rest of their their team um so yeah trying to find ways to make those spaces work for them and they're really flexible is something that i think is going to come forward um i don't i mean will i be designing in 30 years yeah yeah so it's a long old stint but this is true i hope i am but yeah well i said yes not because you wouldn't have made so much money you would have retired because you probably would have done oh i hope but there will still be human designers surely it's yes that's more what i was going with yes not like yeah you have to be slugging your gas out because you need to pay your mortgage off well it's going that way i don't want to get political yeah oh yeah better not but yeah okay that's yeah i can see that when you say meeting spaces i think everyone like traditionally thinks of a table like of various sizes with chairs and a great big screen no so talk to me about meeting space i actually had this conversation yeah i had this conversation earlier with a client because we were talking about ways that um you can meet up and have a meeting which seems like it sounds so corporate doesn't it when you say it like that but it could literally be this kind of setup that we're sat in now the kind of breacher style seating um and it doesn't mean that that has to be inside a meeting room with four walls it could be more open you could have curtains to zone a space and then open it back up again um they could be lounge rooms they could be podcast rooms like there's so many different ways that you can kind of control a space that has different means of meeting up with people even the way that you maybe plan a tea point and a breakout space you can do so so there's the flexibility to have almost like these different areas of space where the sound could be controlled in one area so you could have a more informal meeting in one space but then in another space is a little bit more vibrant and buzzy you can sit at a countertop and have a coffee with someone and a quick catch-up those are the types of meeting spaces that i mean it's not that traditional boring i know just you hear the word meeting room and i'm sure like people flick up in their head like this table and it's like like lots of chairs and i just think actually there's so many conversations that might need to be had or i feel that people have got such like so much more pressure than they used to have or like what you're saying about digital and like getting whatsapps and everything that's also happening on a personal level so some might get some sad news but it's before you didn't find out until you got home or something like that.

6:29So you need those spaces, like, for emotional sort of regulation, if you like, and either to go and celebrate or to go and have a little cry. Oh, a crying room, yeah. Oh, that would be quite cool, wouldn't it? It'd be yellow, wouldn't it? It is. It definitely would be yellow. What, a yellow crying room? A yellow room would be crying. Oh, right, yeah. The crying room would be yellow. You think so? Mm-mm. Why would you make... Because it's happy, then I'll cheer them up. Oh, you want to cheer them up? Oh, yeah, yeah. Yellow is a, like, cheerful colour. I recently did a wellness room, which is for all sorts of different reasons.

7:05It's more flexible. So you could have it for like a new mum who's coming to the office and perhaps needs to, they're still breastfeeding, so they need to pump. It could be for someone who just needs to go and have a big old cry as well. So it's kind of different. It was for a different kind of means. but I did it in a really pale pink and then it had some like cute little pink tiles and everything and I thought it was just quite a calming, simple room and I quite liked it. Yeah, just a soft pink foil. So I kind of made it, yeah. By the way, I'm loving all these references to curtains you're bringing in.

7:43Anyone would think I paid you. What? I'm not getting paid for this? Yeah, obviously, but like extra. Extra on top. extras or ad spos yeah okay cool pink pink um wellness i know i know i love that though because normally wellness rooms are green yeah i know i'm fed up of doing green wellness rooms i'm just saying yeah i just want to see things up a bit yeah i think it's cool yeah i would go yellow not like bright yellow not like highlighted yellow i'd just go like kind of honey turmeric yes i like that probably like layer it as well with like maybe some little pops of brighter but like mostly like just soft like even like this bleacher seating is like yellow yeah and consider maybe the lighting in that space as well perhaps we you just dim the lighting a bit as well um and you have like floor lamps instead so you like controlling the ambience of the room so if someone does need to go in there and just have a minute because they have a headache they can control that as well and it wouldn't be hard to do we'd have analog switches yeah well That's why we speak to the AV specialists and all those people.

8:50Figure it all out. And they love that. Yeah, yeah. Hey, by the way. I do think it does need to get simpler for people. Yeah? Yeah, I do think so. Because it can get a little bit complicated, can't it? Like when you get into a meeting room, there's like a whole thing of switches. And which one do you press first? I know. I know. I mean, I'm the designer. I'm supposed to know about all of this. But I find it difficult as well. And I always ask someone else to do it too. And how do you do the handover to the client? How do you like induct them and everything like that? Well, usually at the end of a project, we'll have a full kind of walk around of the space.

9:25And they basically have an induction for all of that. So they'll be able to understand exactly how to work their folding wall, exactly how to work their new hot water tap and stuff like that. And then I just kind of sit back and watch it unfold and hope that they love it usually. but there's a whole process that goes into the end of a project and making sure that the client is satisfied. We never just walk away.