The future needs innovative spaces
Time for us to introduce ourselves. We are 7places. We are an innovation agency and we burn for spaces. More specifically, the future of our living spaces. We believe that our world will be a better place when inspiring living spaces are no longer a luxury good, but are made accessible to anyone. Today, we are already turning inspiring spaces into reality and developing digital products along this theme. With everything we do, we are tackling a field that still has a lot of potential. Inspiring places will make people healthier and companies more successful in the future – but a large part of the spaces that are created every day are neither inspiring nor beneficial. The time is ripe to change that – the Future is loading.
Why rooms? From the cellar to Notre Dame
Do you know the feeling when you enter a cellar? An uneasy feeling spreads. In some companies, unfortunately, it feels similar to enter an office. As designers, technology and storytelling experts, we can and must change that.
“There is no New Work in the Old Office.”
This sentence will be one of the most important lessons for employers for the next few years.
Conversely, do you know the feeling when you enter an imposing building, say Notre Dame. We are awestruck and impressed. The physical place does all this to us. Every time a new place is created, we have it in our hands to create an inspiring focal point or the next 08/15 place that no one really wants to visit.
No, we are not megalomaniacs. We only burn for experience that makes our customers more successful.
Because we are not complete megalomaniacs, we do not try to make Notre Dame out of every room. As a B2B company, we help companies in different sectors to turn their spaces into real magnets for customers, employees and visitors. Companies secure the best skilled workers when they have inspiring office spaces. A point of sale is also visited more often and generates more sales if it delivers experiences that stay in the memory. Innovative spatial experiences – like those from 7places – make all this possible and their success is measurable.
But now explain these innovative spaces again.
Many people can’t imagine much about “innovative living spaces”. In cars, on the other hand, no one is surprised anymore that they are full of intelligent companions, screens, sensor technology, automated assistants and other latest developments. But at the same time, these are always bathed in good, soothing design. We do nothing else when we intelligently design working environments, shopping centres or the stay in a restaurant. Spaces that provide people with information intuitively and interactively and that generate a far-reaching radiance are created – and we never lose the designer’s aesthetic eye in the process.
Fears of the future and hyper reality
When we talk about Future Spaces, what comes to mind for some is a vision of the future as painted by Japanese filmmaker Keiichi Matsuda: A fully augmented world in which no spatial experience is possible any more without digital enrichment. From 7places’ point of view, we don’t need to go that far at all: An innovative place begins where people’s needs are addressed. It doesn’t matter whether we start with a single pop-up space, renovate an office, create a restaurant or network an entire city.
Urban Kitchen meets Alpenstube – The world needs more spatial experience à la Hühnerei.
If you want to make spaces that change lives, we have to have courage above all. One example of a particularly courageous place is the Hühnerei restaurant. The assignment for 7places was clear: merge an urban kitchen with an alpine tavern. Since then, digital chickens have been running across the table, an egg portal brings gamification to life to the enthusiasm of the users and a modern and colourful room design creates a contrast to the tradition of the house.
We won’t stop until everyone has access to good space.
So we are convinced that what spaces can do for brands, for businesses and for the public is underestimated across the board. Shops not only attract new customers and companies the skilled workers who are in demand everywhere with smart space solutions. New life could move into the increasingly empty city centres; in rural areas, conditions could be created that make life more liveable. We want a new community to form and meet – in unique places.
To learn more, listen to the zzpodcast with Katharina Aguilar and Stefan Lingner or one of our other podcasts – or send an email to our innovation agency: info@7places.com
