News Room

Hi, this is Ted Nguyen. I'm at a special place, at LPA in Irvine where there are some exciting things that are happening.

Ted: Can you introduce yourself as well as your position?

Bob: Sure, I'm Bob Kupper, CEO of LPA. Welcome to our facilities. This is our new expansion space. We were downstairs and now we’ve expanded upstairs too. We’ve brought in a number of sustainable items to make it a better space for our environment and for our people. Glenn can give you a run through if you’d like.

Ted: So Glenn, tell me about some of the design features and about what they mean for the future of office spaces?

Glenn: Well, that’s one of the things that Bob was touching upon. What we were looking for here is to take existing space, which is generally very enclosed space, and open it up to our wonderful climate, here in Irvine. So behind us you see operable windows and we can feel it. We’re standing inside the building and yet we’re getting natural breezes. A lot of that helps to reduce operating costs, but it also enhances the qualitative aspect of the space. For us as creative designers it’s very inspiring to have a connection to nature.

Ted: I know that as humans we’re all connected by nature. It’s our natural tendency, and when we’re confined to office space it’s very unnatural

Glenn: Right.

Ted: So how did you bring the natural climate in? And in what other aspects of the design and architecture did you do that?

Glenn: Okay, so we did operable windows and then above our head you see these really bright spots in the ceiling. Those are Solatubes. They’re skylights that focus the sun and bring it to the interior in such a way that it’s not so harsh. It’s actually a very nice kind of light quality. So, with the natural breezes and the natural lighting every aspect of the interior has the feeling as though you’re outdoors.

Ted: That’s amazing. Tell me about the environment here at LPA. I see open spaces, there isn’t an “office” per se –everything is open.

Bob: We have no private offices. We feel it’s important for our collaboration and our projects that were all involved with projects together. The work environment everyone here, everyone has easy contact with other people. And in between the spaces here, we have meeting areas so we can sit down and work on projects and discuss how we’re going to do them.

Ted: So where is your office?

Bob: Well my “workspace” is over on the other side.

Ted: So that is your workspace right there, so just over there? It’s just like everything else. I think that is another thing that is really unique in that you’re not sitting yourself apart from the team. As corporate America we’re always fighting for that corner office space, right? With the walls, and privacy. Do you think this is the future? What’s the future hold?

Bob: I have to tell you. We’ve had work space without offices for about 15 years, and it’s a great environment. We work better as a team. We know what is going on. We aren’t isolated from each other and it’s better for the firm.

Ted: So as a designer and architect where are you headed as far as the future? I know that LPA’s at the front end, very cutting edge. Is that going to translate to major things for your clients? And also, the trends that you’re setting now, are they trends or do they have staying power for the future of office space?

Male: We feel it has staying power and it’s part of what we call our “Design DNA.” Once we know how to do something better, we can never go back to how we used to do it. So office spaces, interior spaces that are closed off from the environment, we now know the benefits of opening it up and including nature not just from a qualitative standpoint, but from a financial standpoint. Once you get that, it’s just a better, more informed way of working. An open office layout in today’s economy allows us to communicate in real time because there isn’t a barrier between us, so to be able to identify and resolve problems in a kind of inclusive manner is also part of what we see for the future.

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