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Hundreds of the country's brightest tech and media companies had been already calling White Collar Factory home, before it even opened. Welcome to the office of the future – conceived, designed and built using cutting-edge technology.
In London’s Old Street Roundabout – nicknamed Silicon Roundabout by the thousands of tech businesses who call the area their home – one building towers above the rest. White Collar Factory is a 16-storey 237,000 sq ft office tower at the centrepiece of a new urban office campus.
Commissioned by developer Derwent London and working with AHMM architects to conceive, design and build the building, we’ve thrown out the rule book, using technology in a radical way to create the greatest possible experience for not only those working there but also potential tenants, investors and the wider community.
How do you bring the future to life for a demanding marketplace?
Despite its position over a busy intersection, one request from tenants was the ability to open windows. To help people understand the noise impact, we used the Arup SoundLab to allow clients and designers to hear exactly what the sound would be like in different scenarios.
Results showed that when combined with normal background noise, the noise from open windows was almost inaudible at higher levels and acceptable lower down. This was crucial in convincing letting agents and prospective tenants that the plan would work.
Connectivity for a digital workforce
The building is the first in the UK to achieve a new certification for buildings independently tested to see if they provide leading edge digital infrastructure. The Wired Certified Platinum for Development & Redevelopment rating recognises that White Collar factory provides 237,000 sq ft over 16 floors of office space with super high-speed connectivity.
This is one of the reasons so many leading creative firms took space in the building before it opened.
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