In light of the ever-increasing focus on our office structures and the environment’s impact on Mother Nature, the best thing you can do for your business is invest in its circularity. The circular office design is gaining traction as the built environment’s effect on our surroundings is vociferated louder daily. According to official government data, the artificial environment made up almost half of the country’s carbon footprint two years ago, where office spaces weighed a lot. Whether you look at the HVAC structure, the recreational rooms, the parking lot, or any other area of your business territory, it certainly has a lot of potential to lower your carbon emissions and bring about the merited advantages.
Since the UN predicts that almost 70% of the global population will live in urban areas by the middle of the decade, how you design and manage your business offices will only become more important. Let us show you how the circular economy transforms office fit-out and design and ways you can ensure yours adapts quickly to change without contributing to alarming material and product waste.
Photo source: https://unsplash.com/photos/a-group-of-people-sitting-around-a-wooden-table-ZKHksse8tUU
The Circular Office Unearthed
In the circular economy we’re striving for, the office environment is all about recycling, reusing, and building adaptable and flexible workstations that meet any possible need. Burger King, Adidas, and IKEA are some of the first companies to lead by example, having long paved the path for innovative solutions that can be implemented on a large scale. Fast forward, and designers and architects at Vepa have demonstrated that businesses ranging from the smallest to the largest can transform their workspaces in ways that diminish the carbon footprint, promote well-being and a dynamic flow at work, and make the most of the available space at the fairest costs. With a focus on sustainable solutions and technologies and committed office sets providers, your business can turn every day into Earth Overshoot Day, marking a step towards circularity, whether you’re activating in the hospitality, education, fashion, or other type of sector where embracing sustainability is a must.
Who Should You Look To?
The circular office of our day spots opportunities to drive change toward a zero-waste lifestyle, from slashing garbage to reusing waste to taking advantage of circular services and products. These engage both externally and internally with suppliers, staff, senior management, stakeholders like vepa.co.uk, and intermediaries who can help contribute to the long-term business sustainability and the positive well-being of members. Opportunities can take myriad forms, from restoring and repurposing workspace equipment and furniture to achieving these features through sustainable providers prioritising the march toward circularity.
Take, for instance, the possibility of renting office furniture and equipment for a specific time horizon. This doesn’t only contribute to lower manufacturing levels but also better waste management. Ultimately, you can feel the difference in your office and your employees’ moods, as well as your business’s bottom line, at the end of 2024.
What About The Construction And Design?
Circularity is essential to your office’s entire lifespan, from the fit-out to the arrangement, through its operation and usage, and potential demolition. Renovation and fit-out initiatives are inching toward the circular economy by keeping the already-set-up building and modifying only the interior, contrasting the deconstruction and reconstruction of new structures.
To ensure your office environment keeps up with changes, its eternal use must be a critical consideration before commencing the design journey:
- Avant-garde technologies, smart design solutions, and off-site prefabrication must eliminate trash. As long as you don’t compromise the safety and security of your workspace, don’t order more material than you know you’ll use.
- Look for furnishings and products made partially or entirely with refurbished, reclaimed, or reused materials instead of fresh new ones. Future-oriented designers should be able to help you out in this regard.
- The building needs to be designed for effortless demolition, boosting its reusability in another location later on.
- Maximise the use of your office’s current resources and reduce the wastefulness resulting from daily use. For instance, you can provide reusable cutlery and cups, decreasing printing. Out-of-use or old equipment and furniture can be repaired or repurposed instead of dumped and replaced.
- Demolition must be carefully planned, taking the time to ensure the reuse of elements like partitions, flooring, and ceilings.
- Whenever feasible, join take-back programs, which enable recycling materials and products that are no longer in use and into new ones.
Ending Overconsumption
In the era of fast shopping and on-the-spot gratification, people are the victims of an overconsumption and waste cycle. Countless firms may have already embraced fancy zero-waste projects, such as producing food waste, buying reusable packaging, going paperless, etc. Still, the workplace’s furniture must be carefully considered if a more significant difference is desired. According to Wikipedia, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch equals around 1.6MN sq, or seven times the UK’s size. Plastics of different sizes and purposes lie at the bottom of the ocean in the high seas, and furniture represents a massive category of trash contributors. Since governments aren’t directly linked to these territorial waters, they don’t take their management upon themselves.
To stop overconsuming, you must first stop overbuying, meaning you’ll reuse glass, plastics, wood, and any other material that makes repurposing feasible. Work with workplace furniture storage providers that use on-site recycling centres and ensure the reusing of furnishings that aren’t up-cycled.
We Must Make A Case For Fast Furniture
A furniture problem everywhere raises obstacles in our march toward the circular economy. A considerable number of furnishings get dumped and never recovered. Fixing these problems starts with working on the purchasing mindset, meaning that you must first consider your acquisitions through the perspective of a whole-of-life purchasing strategy.
Becoming long-term in your thinking, you must ask yourself how the eyed product will look and serve your needs years from now and whether it can be repaired. Consider expanding the warranty or ensuring that local installation and fixing people can intervene to help bring the obsolete item back to life.
An acquisition with a mind-blowingly cheap price tag often does more harm than good, whether you consider your business budget or its environmental impact. Think every step through and always be green to see the benefits down the road.
