A curious architect is a good architect. With this in mind Tengbom’s Stockholm office left our home near Slussen after many years to explore and experience one of Stockholm’s most experimental and inspiring urban development projects: Hagastaden. In an old mineral factory from 1934, we built our pink dream.

The Tengbom-branded move from the iconic Glass House on Katarinavägen by Slussen left for Hagastaden on April 1, 2023. On the address labels: Hälsingegatan 49. Before you have the chance to ask why, we give you the answer – change and renewal are good for creativity. And as architects, we need both creativity and insights into how cityscapes (and the people in those environments) change. The  aftermath of the pandemic had also changed the way we work and created new needs for our staff.

“Hagastaden’s diverse architecture, many green areas, and wide range of services create a creative and vibrant environment for us to work, experiment, and develop together with our customers and partners,” says Practise Director Mark Humphreys.

Photo: Felix Gerlach

Photo: Emil Fagander

Photo: Felix gerlach

New growth rings but the same brick

Many buildings in Hagastaden take us back to the industrialism of the 1930s. For more than 40 years, the red brick-clad building, the Mineral Factory, housed Apotekarnes mineral water production. Through a careful transformation from industry to office, the industrial feel of the building lives on to this day. From the courtyard you can clearly see the intersection of the historic factory section and the modern glass extension. Here, our employees have a green oasis for coffee, lunch, and refreshing meetings – furnished with Tengbom-designed outdoor furniture.

Photo: Emil Fagander

Photo: Felix Gerlach

Photo: Emil Fagander

Spatial discovery in pink

Thanks to a flexible floor plan with many possibilities, we were able to create a functional, creative, and stimulating work environment for our employees. The spatial journey starts at the entrance. Here, the visitor is greeted by a welcoming and dynamic “Arena” with inspiration areas, inviting touchdown workstations, sofa groups, ping pong tables, lunch tables, an open kitchen, and a library. Instead of a traditional reception, we have a mobile host who welcomes and guides our guests. It is more like an integrated part of the flexible workspaces. The Arena also works well for larger events.

“From the Arena, you can see right into the modelling workshop, a large wooden pavilion with impressive shop windows. The further into the premises you go, the more surprises you encounter. Walking through our office should be a bit of a discovery tour,” continues Mark.

A 1200 square meter spray-painted pink ceiling connects many of the different parts of the office. The colour lies densely over pipe and ceiling installations, leaving clear traces of the former factory. The pink creates an optimistic, soft, and warm feeling that brings life and builds identity.

The Activity guides

The office is adapted to an activity-based work approach and divided into zones that offer rooms and environments for all types of work. The workstationes are flexible and allow for different types of grouping and ways of working at different times. We simply let the needs of the day or the task to guide us. Or the mood, for that matter.

“There is a room for every moment, task, and mood. When I want to work a bit secluded, I hang out in the niche of the wooden pavilion; when I need to brainstorm with my colleagues, I sit down in the open-plan office. The sofa groups work well for more relaxed meetings, and the many small team rooms facilitate our digital-physical way of working,” says our architect Pernille Andersen.

Gym? Yes, of course. It is fully equipped and ready to welcome fitness enthusiasts both during and outside working hours.

Be creative!

Our new office should not be perceived as tidy but rather as a living and experimental workshop. A natural meeting place that breathes freedom and creativity. An encouraging and permissive hub that prioritizes co-creation. In common areas, we share what is on our drawing boards here and now through sketches, models, material and colour samples, and more. In an increasingly digitized work environment, physical experiences are becoming more important. Being able to touch and feel.

In an increasingly digitized work environment, physical experiences become even more important. Being able to touch and feel.

“We want our employees to be encouraged to try something new, to be inspired, to have new ideas, and the opportunity to experiment – it is a crucial foundation in our work as architects. That’s why we showcase what we are working on and our collective intelligence even more,” says Mark.

Close collaborations yield good results

Our new office is the result of good collaborations, especially with Atrium Ljungberg and TL Bygg.

“We worked as a team with Atrium Ljungberg and TL Bygg, who were very responsive to our needs. Thanks to that, we got maximum value out of the existing framework,” says Mark.

Awards and recognition

Nominated for Inside World Festival of Interiors 2024 (WAF) and Sweden’s Most Beautiful Office 2024. Winner of Sustainable Interior of the Year i Dezeen Awards 2024. Winner of Guldstolen Interiör 2024.

Work from home or feel at home in the office? Developments in recent years – not least the pandemic – indicate that we will do both. When EY commissioned Tengbom to furnish their new Stockholm premises, “living room” was one of the key words.

“It is important for the office to offer something that is not available at home,” says Sofia Dahlén, lead architect for the assignment. “That something includes the interaction with colleagues. A workplace should be a source of inspiration and input from others, and the environment should really promote that.”

“The aspects of our sustainability footprint that we can control are travel and the physical premises. It’s a big step to reduce our spaces but increase the number of workspaces – making it more optimized and multifunctional.”

Jessica Schmidt, management consultant and project manager, EY

Efficient and versatile spaces

The new office is part of a larger, more wide-ranging change at EY – which involves integrating new ways of working into the global strategy. A contemporary workplace is a key part of recruiting and retaining employees and attracting new customers.

“These are issues we help our clients with, so we should practice what we preach and have a modern, vibrant office,” says Jessica Schmidt, Management Consultant at EY and Project Manager for the transformation.

EY Headquarters occupies four floors in a new building in the heart of Stockholm, with views over the busy streets, shops and walkways. Multifunctional spaces allow for better use of a smaller footprint, fewer square feet, in an activity-based office. The work areas are divided into zones, which lets employees chose whether they want a quiet, focused place to work or would prefer to interact with colleagues. They can also interact with others in the many lounge areas which form an important part of the floor plan. At the same time, there are individual meeting rooms, the majority of which are set up for digital meetings.

Holistic approach to promote health

It is highly likely that the way we work has changed for good: digital meetings are here to stay and the office will play a greater role as a collective hub where company culture is formed. Being innovative and effective at work is essential for a business, as is providing a health-promoting environment in the form of good ergonomics and a well-lit environment with good lighting – something that is often missing when we work from home. At Tengbom, we are passionate about creating dynamic and healthy environments. And the best results are achieved when there is trust and commitment between all parties. Especially in a project like this which was commissioned right at the start of the pandemic.

“From the outset, we could see that it was not just a question of finding a few pieces of furniture. The client was fully committed; they wanted to get more out of the office. We put trust in each other’s professionalism to find common solutions,” says Tove Prahl, Project Manager at Lindelöf, who was responsible for buying the furniture.

The unique interior design at EY Headquarters is unusual for a large office. It is intended to feel more like a comfy living room than a stylish office. Variety is the key to this, with plants, rugs, textiles and accessories.

Islands with strong connections

As an international company, EY Headquarters also wants its offices to feel local – as soon as you step into the office, you should be able to see that you are in Stockholm, even if you miss the Sergels Torg landmark in the urban landscape outside. Stockholm is a city of opposites, and the design concept reflects this encounter between cityscape and landscape. The result is an office that is technically at the cutting edge but also embraces timeless and beautiful natural materials that capture the all-encompassing concept of Stockholm, City of Islands.

The connection to islands continues in the staircases, which link floors and zones like the city’s bridges. The aluminum expanded metal ceilings are partially painted in copper tones. They draw inspiration from Stockholm’s idyllic sunsets—or perhaps its more frequent cloudy skies. Light, muted pastels and natural shades of gray, brown, and beige transport you through the city. The journey moves from the heights of the southern city island of Söder to the warm cliffs of the archipelago.

EY Headquarters – an office you want to return to

The driving idea was to create a timeless design that lasts and encompasses the entire office, not just the public areas.

“The focus of the office isn’t just the external lounge,” says Tove Prahl. “We wanted to create a workplace centered around the people who work here, not just provide small, cramped areas for them to work in. The workplace of the future will be more employee-friendly.”

Every cloud has a silver lining. If employees are to return after working from home during the pandemic, the office must offer an environment that truly suits them. Jessica Schmidt believes this is exactly that—a workplace many want to come back to as soon as they can.

When the move to a new building on top of the Mall of Scandinavia in Solna was planned in 2014, Telia took the opportunity to not only acquire new facilities, but also to use the project as part of the plan to become a “new generation Telco”.

“The highest level executives were there listening and engaging. Telia was an enthusiastic client who constantly pushed us to be better. ‘We don’t want what we already know you can do. We want you to find new solutions,’ they said,” according to project architect Torbjörn Höeg.

“This is a new office for a new Telia. The main function is to be a place of cooperation and a place of inspiration and energy. Where they sit together, see each other, and are seen. They did a lot of work with branding at the same time as we worked on the interior design, and our efforts dovetailed. They tell the same story but with different “dialects”,” he continues.

Photographer: Per Ranung

Photographer: Per Ranung

Photographer: Per Ranung

Photographer: Per Ranung

Photographer: Per Ranung

Photographer: Per Ranung

A dizzying undertaking

Telia has 3,800 employees and its headquarters measure in at 47,000 square metres. What’s more, they needed to begin with the move as soon as possible. After winning the competition, the challenge began for our interior architects.

“During the first six weeks after the holidays in 2014, we did program work and planned solutions for the main part of the buildings. There were only four of us architects. That wasn’t supposed to work, but it did,” said Torbjörn Höeg.

“We had just finished working on Swedbank’s new headquarters, which was on the same scale, and we had taken away a lot of lessons from that experience. Along with the courage to dare,” says Linn Sylvan.

New office – new opportunities

The office consists of five buildings, four of which are clustered around three large atriums. The assignment was to create a well-functioning, activity-based office for a modern media company. The challenges were many. The enormous scale, of course, was one, but also the variations that were needed. Certain departments required special technical solutions while others, such as customer service, had quite different needs.

The atriums help the employees see each other and be seen in a completely different way than in the closed corridors. This building is a place for meeting and communication.

“Early on, we found a basic structure that worked. We wanted to give Telia a sense of speed, agility and energy. It was important to instil this active feeling, while making sure the office functions as a whole. Now when we pop in for a visit, we see that people have made those different spaces their own,” says Linn Sylvan.

“The atriums help the employees see each other and be seen in a completely different way than in the closed corridors. This building is a place for meeting and communication. There is conversation everywhere,” concludes Torbjörn Höeg.

The interior concept

For the interior design, we developed a concept called Spectrum/Speed of Light, which reflects the brand and the company’s digital operations. The interior breathes with a sense of speed and action, inviting activity and movement, as well as providing energy through a wide spectrum of colours with strong accents. The concept, along with Telia’s core values Dare, Care and Simplify – and a major focus on sustainability – were the leitmotifs of this project.