Slack Toronto Office

Slack retained Dubbeldam Architecture + Design to fit out the technology company's Toronto office inside a former knitting and textile factory in the heart of downtown. Three storeys of the mid-rise brick and beam building were reworked to suit a twenty-first century workplace while honouring the property's industrial heritage.

The design draws on a "threads of communication" concept, translating the lines of yarn once spun on the site, and the messaging service Slack itself provides, into linear geometries throughout the interior. Continuous angular light fixtures appear to thread through the ceilings, and coloured networking cables run the length of the office across walls and ceilings as visual accents. In the reception, long-term collaborator Kathryn Walter of Felt Studio wrapped diagonal strips of industrial felt across the walls and ceiling to create a warm arrival.

Bold, contrasting pops of colour mark out distinct zones: solitary workstations, phone booths, breakout meeting rooms, a staff lounge and an executive boardroom. Each zone takes a single colour from Slack's brand palette, reinforcing the company identity against the yellow tones of the brick and timber. Meeting rooms are uniform in layout yet individually coloured, with acoustic wall panelling, carpet and furniture coordinated to each scheme. The large communal cafe picks up the linear theme through a white and timber diagonal slat finish in Baltic birch, and converts for all-hands meetings of more than one hundred people.

The 23,000 ft2 (2,137 m2) interior accommodates 140 employees across varied settings that balance focused work with a sense of community.

Architect: Dubbeldam Architecture + Design (Heather Dubbeldam, Scott Sampson). Interior design: Dubbeldam Architecture + Design. Lighting: Marcel Dion Lighting Design. Contractor: mform Construction Group. Photography: Shai Gil and Andrew Snow.