COLLECTIONS › OPEN-PLAN & FREE ADDRESS FLOORS
Collection
No partitions, no fixed desks — the open floors of Japanese offices.
Japanese offices were open-plan long before the word was fashionable, but every desk had an owner. The floors here go further: free address seating, no partitions, and room for people to move with the work.
01 · Nishi-Shimbashi, Tokyo
The open work floor
Desks are free address — you sit where the day suggests — and the edges between working, meeting and resting are left soft rather than walled.
Read the MITSUI & CO. REAL ESTATE office →
02 · Toyosu, Tokyo
The central free space
Free address is the norm, and meeting spots and work surfaces are scattered right through the floor rather than gathered at one end.
Read the DAI-ICHI LIFE office →
03 · Futako-Tamagawa, Tokyo
The open work floor
Desks have no partitions, so “shall we talk about it now?” is always possible.
Read the Rakuten office →
04 · Kioicho, Tokyo
The open work area
Kioicho is laid out so that people move between the two — an open plan where conversation starts by itself, and enclosed spots where thought can go deep.
Read the LINE Yahoo office →
05 · Tokyo
The open space on 5F
Most areas are free address, with many kinds of desks and chairs.
Read the PIXIV office →
06 · Oita
The 2F open space
Upstairs the company uses “group free address”: each team has an area, and within it people sit wherever they like.
Read the OEC office →
07 · Kōjimachi, Tokyo
The open meeting area
The work area is free address with an open meeting area built into it, so that people gather without arranging to.
Read the SOLUTION & TECHNOLOGY office →
08 · Tokyo
A free space in the middle of a floor
Desks are free address, so the seat follows the day’s work and the day’s mood.
Read the NX INFORMATION SYSTEMS office →
09 · Tokyo
The free-address counter
Free address was introduced so that the seat follows the day’s work, and the layout is built around routes that do not cross, health, and keeping paper easy to file.
Read the MITSUBISHI MATERIALS TRADING office →
10 · Toyosu, Tokyo
The open work floor
Work floors have no partitions, and the company is rolling out clean desks and free-address seating — nobody owns a desk; you sit where the day’s work takes you.
Read the NTT DATA office →
11 · Nagoya
The open space
There are almost no partitions, and that, the designers say, is the point: when you can see what others are doing, it becomes easy to call out to them.
Read the THE ASAHI SHIMBUN office →
12 · Kanda, Tokyo
The open space
The head office holds corporate strategy, administration and marketing, and is rolling free address out floor by floor.
Read the Earth Corporation office →Questions
WALL has picked 12: MITSUI & CO. REAL ESTATE (Nishi-Shimbashi, Tokyo), DAI-ICHI LIFE (Toyosu, Tokyo), Rakuten (Futako-Tamagawa, Tokyo), LINE Yahoo (Kioicho, Tokyo), PIXIV (Tokyo), OEC (Oita), SOLUTION & TECHNOLOGY (Kōjimachi, Tokyo), NX INFORMATION SYSTEMS (Tokyo), MITSUBISHI MATERIALS TRADING (Tokyo), NTT DATA (Toyosu, Tokyo), THE ASAHI SHIMBUN (Nagoya), Earth Corporation (Kanda, Tokyo).
They are spread across 3 places: Tokyo (10), Oita (1), Nagoya (1).
Most are private workplaces and not open to the public. WALL reports on them from the companies’ own published material; each office page links to its source.
Keep exploring
13 OF JAPAN’S BEST
Sofas, cafés and planted corners — the lounges where Japanese offices take a break, meet and change scene.
11 OF JAPAN’S BEST
When nobody owns a desk, things go in a locker — the storage that makes free address work in Japan.
14 OF JAPAN’S BEST
Bench desks, window desks and sit-stand desks — where the actual work happens in Japanese offices.
18 OF JAPAN’S BEST
Where companies in Japan eat, meet and pause — from free meals to half-price buffets.
13 OF JAPAN’S BEST
Rooms built for the whole company at once — a stage, a screen and a floor that holds everyone.
11 OF JAPAN’S BEST
Rooms for new-employee training, study sessions and seminars inside Japanese offices.
JAPAN'S BEST-DESIGNED OFFICES