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Architects: Boano Prišmontas
- Area: 4 m²
- Year: 2020
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Photographs:Dylan Drake
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Manufacturers: Boano Prismontas, Can of Gas, DHH Timber, Natura Studios, Trimble, Vectric
Text description provided by the architects. Boano Prišmontas launched “My Room in The Garden”, an affordable prefab home office. The low-cost solution is easy to assemble and it can be built in one day. The structure is made in London and the modular design can fit a garden of any size. The project aims to address the need for affordable and remote working spaces. “My Room in the garden” is an answer to the future way of working, is a cozy prefab hideout for London gardens and courtyard spaces, perfect for those working from home or whoever is in need of pocket space, tailored to their needs and comforts. Boano Prišmontas has been working on this topic for several years, developing successful projects such as Minima Moralia (2016) and The Arches Project (2019).
Although, the need for a work-from-home solution became quite urgent lately when the CV-19 pandemic required designers to come up with new solutions able to combine workspace with domesticity. Adapt & Disrupt! Despite the fact that the lockdown has ended in many countries around the world, an incredibly large number of people are still working from home, often without a clear date in mind when their lives will be returning to normality. We believe normality is no longer there waiting for us, the pandemic brought radical changes that cannot be dismissed or ignored.
If on one side people working from home had to find their ways to integrate work equipment within their current home setting, on the other, companies have started seeing the renting of office space as an unnecessary and avoidable cost. The current live/work balance has been permanently disrupted and both the office and home design standards are now outdated and almost obsolete. A vision for a new live/work balance Distanced desks and laptop stands have populated our living rooms and saturated any shared space. London houses, whose space standards have been squeezed to the minimum, are struggling.
That’s why we believe that it is not fair that employees have to sacrifice and compromise their domestic environment any further. The solution is not to be found inside the houses, but outside. London houses are perfect to host home office pods in backyard gardens, courtyards, gated communities, rooftops, shared amenity spaces, and pocket parks. Starting from £5K for the basic module, “My Room in the Garden” is a solution for both private home-owners and for companies that could reduce their rent cost for big offices in central London by purchasing instead home office pods to their employees.
Structure & finishes The project seeks to find a balance between low-cost and cozy design. The structure is made of digitally fabricated birch plywood modules, that can be customized according to each space and user’s need. Starting from a minimum of 1.8x2.4m at £5K, the home office pods can grow infinitely, by just adding more modules. All modules come at a fixed height of 2.5m which is the max height that doesn’t require planning permission.
The standard finish includes corrugated clear polycarbonate cladding that protects the interior space from the elements and allows for natural light to flood the internal space. The wall modules can host different finishes such as peg wall, mirror, plain or decorated wood, etc. The user can compose the interiors to their taste and need. The higher-spec version includes insulated wall/roof/floor panels and glass door/windows. Sustainability Each component of the home-office pod is geometrically efficient and minimizes any material waste. The dimensioning of each component is based on human dimensions and standard material dimensions. The whole project is designed, manufactured, and pre-assembled in the UK.
