Congrès — Tokyo: a meeting room with a staircase for seating

Concept

An event company’s office is a venue

Congrès makes its living from rooms other people meet in, and it has furnished its own office the same way. The meeting room it leads with has stepped benches running round the outside, so people sit at two different heights; the company’s stated reason is that changing your eye level makes different thinking easier, and it says the room is used for rehearsing presentations as much as for meetings.

From there the logic is consistent. Every meeting room is glazed, so the floor reads as one space rather than a corridor of doors. The entrance runs projection mapping and a hundred-inch monitor, which is a conference organiser’s idea of a front door. And the break space has a screen that drops down, so that the place people go to stop working is also a place to run a rehearsal.

01 · The entrance

Projected, and daylit

The entrance carries projection mapping and a 100-inch monitor, with the logo itself projected. Beyond it the corridor is cut to bring daylight into the circulation.

02 · The stepped room

Sit above or below

The meeting room the company puts first has step benches round its edge. The stated purpose is a change of eye level; the stated use is meetings and presentation practice.

03 · The other rooms

Japanese concept, sofa, glass

The rest of the meeting rooms include one fitted for webinar broadcasts, one built on a Japanese concept, and one furnished with sofas. All of them are glazed.

04 · The work space

Counter seats and family-restaurant booths

The working floor is built around communication spaces rather than desk banks — counter seats, family-restaurant booths, and a space immediately inside the office door. A clear-desk rule is what makes the free address work.

05 · The break space

Café style, with a screen

The break space is café style with a counter, and a screen drops down so that a presentation can be rehearsed there. It is used for meetings as much as for breaks.