JAPAN'S BEST-DESIGNED OFFICESConcept
Three timbers, three jobs
Smaregi makes the software that runs a shop counter, and its Osaka head office is built on a claim about wood. The walls, the floor and the furniture do not share a timber; each one is a species chosen to suit what it has to do. The company describes the overall effect as neutral and warm — and, in a phrase worth pausing on, as a grain flexible enough to accompany challenge and change.
The rest of the floor is straightforward and well-judged: a showroom where the company’s own product can be demonstrated on a real counter, a seminar room, a utility space, and a working floor kept open with glass partitions and whiteboards. The stated purpose of all of it is that people and information should cross.
01 · The entrance
Planting, and pale timber
The entrance is kept pale and planted, with the counter set back from the door.
02 · The showroom
The product, on a real counter
The showroom sets out the company’s own point-of-sale hardware as it would stand in a shop.
03 · The conference room
One long table
A single long table runs the length of the conference room, lit low.
04 · The seminar rooms
For training, and for guests
Two seminar rooms take internal training and visitors.
05 · The utility space
Where the crossing happens
The utility space is the room the company names as making communication active — a counter, round tables and a kitchen end.
06 · The work space
Glass, whiteboards, open desks
The working floor is open, divided by glass rather than by walls, with whiteboards on hand.
