TEXT LAUREN GRACE MORRIS
Has the cubicle been resurrected from its 20th-century resting place? Perhaps too soon to say with certainty, but with the precautions and measures necessary to prevent COVID-19 transmission, it’s likely. Pallavi Dean is one of those in camp cubicle: the designer told Frame that she believes they will be central elements in the reconfigured workspace. ‘Partitions are really hot right now,’ Ben Waber of Humanyze told Wired. In the same article, Cushman & Wakefield’s Michael Boonshoft explained that the relative efficiency and affordability of these divider solutions will make them favourable among companies scrambling to rethink their offices for the safety of their employees.
But this doesn’t mean that workers that emerge from home quarantines are resigned to a sure future of drab grey blockades and inevitable claustrophobia. In fact, the privacy-promising, acoustic-friendly and design-forward elements that studios and brands are presently introducing have a potential to actually upgrade pre-pandemic workspaces. Here are seven great examples.
Room Dividers by Dutch Invertuals for High Tech Software Cluster / Brainport Innovation Campus; dutchinvertuals.nl. Photos: Ronald Smits
DV300-Screen by DVO; dvo.it.
Sepa Rolls by Sezgin Aksu for Caimi Brevetti; caimi.com. Photo: Victor Zastol’skiy
Ridge by Arktura; arktura.com.
Caring System by Estel; estel.com.
Hinoki by Federica Biasi for Manerba; manerbaspa.com.
COV by Matteo Cibic Studio in collaboration with FusinaLab; matteocibicstudio.com.
