This project, was developed for a Design Challenge among the Center of Design Excellence designers at Steelcase Monterrey in the purpose of creating a solution for the home office trend, along with the Tiny Living concept. Mauricio Cuellar and myself gathered Steelcase research and product portfolio, to create an accessible solution for the average employee who occasionally enjoys working from home. Spoiler alert, we won.

We decided that by combining a set of basic elements for a functional workspace. We propose to deliver a simple and replicable solution for whatever your available home space is.

With this, we look to deliver human experience while providing resources to get work done. Not losing your home space to an office. 

And good news is that we know the fundamental combination to make that work.

With a holistic approach that considers the physical, cognitive and emotional wellbeing of people.

Interconnecting zones and settings that become destinations where people have choice and control over where and how they work.

And technology that optimizes place.

We found out that subconsciously what we all really look forward to is:

- Personalizing the space as our own.

- A focus mode day, away from the office’s distraction.

- Comfort as part of our choice and control over our environment.

- Privacy, as it is far easier to regulate it at home.

- And organization, which becomes as twice as important when sharing a space.

So it seems, that enthusiasm for remote work was tempered by the fundamental need to seek spaces that offer both emotional and physical comfort – somewhere where it was easy to get work done.

But the desire for emotional comfort sometimes leads people to make choices that don’t support their physical comfort or ability to perform. 

We are not pursuing towards the perfect layout or prefab office product.

We are going towards the concept and essence of identifying what you need, to adapt any home temporarily into a work space.

Sometimes we collaborate, and sometimes we don’t. We need to shift occasionally towards a focus mode.

We save time by not commuting to work, but technology plays a strength role at the office.

Privacy is a valuable benefit of staying at home when handling certain tasks, but we should never underestimate the value of connection time with our teams.

The same goes for comfort, which can be exchanged for having more sophisticated tools at the office.

Not forgetting what we save to the environment by saving trips to the office, versus getting shared resources at the office.

With technology that optimizes place.

How we understand ancillary

Pursuing product innovation

And broadening our portfolio offer with our partners.

Let’s say you have an extra room/space in your house or apartment to destine it for an office. Then you’d be able to layout a setting, buy some furniture, and call it a victory.

But what if you rent a 500 square feet studio apartment in NYC with a roommate? Would you be willing to interchange your dining table or living room space for a desk? Even if you’d use it 2 times a week? We think not.

But we also, strongly believe that these decisions or capabilities shouldn’t define your ability to perform well from a remote work mode.