One of the world’s biggest architecture firms says it feels “optimistic and committed” to 2025, amid cooling inflation, looming rate cuts and a growing push among developers to start reinvesting cash.
On Thursday, US-based Gensler released its “Design Forecast”, which names the trends it expects to shape design in the coming year. These trends include a focus on how design must adapt to changes in urban life: the constant shift from home to work, the move to downtowns and commercial districts, and increasingly affordable housing.
“Our cities are collectors,” Jordan Goldstein, Gensler’s CEO, said in an interview. luck mid november “That’s where we see the power of design to better shape that experience.”
The COVID pandemic caused a change in city life that can still be seen. Despite the company calling back to the office five days a week hybrid work it seems to have settled into the professional life of the city, reducing the need for office space and at the same time reducing pedestrian traffic. city centers. This, along with higher interest rates, has caused a massive global downturn commercial real estate marketas office and retail tenants reduce their physical presence.
“The issues we were seeing post-pandemic are driving (these design trends) a lot,” Goldstein said. Then add what he calls “crisis multipliers”—like technological change and sustainability—to name a few.
But he noted that planners are now much more willing to consider experimental redevelopments in the urban core. “There’s an opportunity to have these conversations (with planners) that, frankly, didn’t necessarily happen on a regular basis, before the pandemic,” he said. And in some markets, like India, these discussions “weren’t happening, period.”
In one example, Gensler is working with the city government of Philadelphia to turn it around South wide street A 10-block-long art park with green spaces, outdoor recreation spaces, and public artwork. The company is doing a similar project in Chicago Michigan Avebuilding new green spaces, performance venues and a new cafe at the Jane Byrne Park water tower.
“Most of our cities know that they cannot move forward in the future by doing things the way they have been doing. Bringing design into the mix encourages innovation (and) experimentation,” Gensler CEO Elizabeth Brink said in mid-November.
Unique and unpredictable
In “Design Forecast,” Gensler identifies five trends it calls “the most important and entrepreneurial insights our clients need to know,” culled from dozens of offices around the world.
“We come to all of our locations and ask: What are you seeing? What needs do you see in your location?” Brink said in mid-November.
There are several trends with the need to rethink the post-Covid city, as neighborhoods move away from the more traditional mix of office districts, neighborhoods, and separate shopping and entertainment districts that mark most modern cities.
For example, Gensler predicts that mixed-use districts will take “center stage in 2025” as cities seek to “drive community engagement and bring people together around shared experiences.”
Brink and Goldstein referred to the idea of a “20-minute city,” or an urban environment where people can access home, work, and entertainment within a 20-minute commute.
But beyond that, Brink suggested that there is a desire to create “a more immersive and participatory type of experience”, and he gave sports as an example. “People want to live unique and unexpected experiences. They are doing it together, and it is something that is creating a sense of community”, he explained.
How to fix the office
Another important design trend highlighted by Gensler is the need to modernize the workplace. Instead of ordering people back to the office, employers should make it a valuable place to work. The offices will be an “employee experience” and “inspiration”, the company predicts, as tenants pursue a “flight to quality” that meets the “professional aspirations” of their employees.
“We know the workplace is still very important,” Brink said in mid-November. “It’s really important for organizations. It’s really important for creativity. It’s really important for connection, it’s really important for the human experience,” he explained.
Gensler’s global workplace survey, published in May, found that nearly every employee in a high-performing office has access to a focused concentration space, compared to just 26% in low-performing workplaces.
Some companies have successfully revived HR after moving to a friendlier office. UK HSBC bank doubled the rate where New York workers entered the office after moving to the Spiral designed by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels.
However, the decline in commercial real estate caused by hybrid work will not go away. Gensler predicts that depressed prices offer developers the opportunity to create “valuable new real estate.” Lower interest rates may also encourage developers to step up and convert unused office space into something more in demand. The architecture firm says the “appropriate reuse boom” will go beyond the straightforward transition from office to apartment, as developers embrace “creative transformations” including healthcare, science labs and senior living.
But Brink notes that the transition from office to home is easier said than done. Offices do not challenge the traditional apartment design, as plumbing infrastructure and kitchen areas must be added.
A co-housing model, with smaller units and shared bathrooms and kitchens, suggests that convection will be easier for developers. Construction costs can be cut by a third, with conversions three times as many units.
“It’s a creative way to look at some of these conversations that could be great for different urban populations: Students, retirees, anyone who just needs a place,” he suggested.
Converting underutilized office buildings into residential complexes could help with another of Gensler’s 2025 design trends: a push toward “market-rate affordable housing,” as changes in zoning laws and building codes encourage the creation of all types of housing.
One plus one is three’
Gensler, founded in 1965 by architect Art Gensler, has more than 6,000 designers spread over 17 countries in the Americas, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Gensler’s many projects include: Headquartered in Santa Clara, California of Nvidiahas Terminal One which is still under construction at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, and Shanghai Towerthe third tallest building in the world. The company reported $1.84 billion in revenue for its 2023 event.
Brink and Goldstein took over as CEOs of Gensler in April. Their predecessors, Diane Hoskins and Andy Cohen, ran the architecture firm together for nearly 20 years.
Courtesy of Gensler
Gensler is an unusual example of a company that has embraced the co-director model. Other companies have tried to have two CEOs with mixed success: Salesforce and SAP both within a year one of their two co-directors resigned. (On Monday, the wood chipper Intel was modeled after co-directors David Zinsner and Michelle Johnston to serve as Holthaus temporary co-directors(replacing retiring CEO Pat Gelsinger.)
However, successful co-CEOs say the structure allows executives to rely on each other for support, provides a check on a particular leader’s biases, or simply empowers the C-suite to get more done each day. “Most CEOs have 24 hours in a day, we have 48,” Hoskins said. luck‘s Leadership Next podcast last year
“We can both work together and it can be a ‘one plus one equals three’ scenario,” Goldstein said. “We each have some special passions, and we combine them, and it resonates around the company.”
