A Look Inside McCann Worldgroup’s Madrid Headquarters

Location: Madrid, Spain
Date completed: May 2016
Size: 60,270 square feet
Design: Studio Banana
Photos: Rubén Bescos

Michal
Technology
8 years ago

McCann Worldgroup, a global agency network that delivers strategic marketing solutions, advertising agency models, and advertising campaigns, hired architecture firm Studio Banana, to design their new headquarters in Madrid, Spain.

“To this end we embarked on an experimental co-design journey with MWG’s creative and executive team and Studio Banana’s team of architects, product and graphic designers, workplace strategists and communication experts. The result is a holistic project where all aspects are highly integrated at multiple levels. Not only did we create an evocative and inspiring workplace for 550 collaborators, but also the way-finding system, the bespoke design of the desks as well as new working methods and rituals. The main underlying goal throughout the project was to create an environment supportive of innovative work dynamics adapted to the renewed ethos of the brand. Set in a 1950s textile factory, the project strips the host building down to its bare essentials, preserving its industrial feel as scenic backdrop, and subsequently colonizes its three floors (6.200 m2 / 66.700 sqft) through a strategy of built “huts” (harboring private offices, meeting rooms, project rooms, teleconferencing rooms etc) that punctuate the space and delineate carefully-sized open plan areas. Each of the latter hosts a project team, thus supporting the sought out cohesiveness and collaborative work culture. The figure-ground dichotomy between the huts and the open plan areas generates a fluid circulation concept and an array of in-between spaces, which have been enlivened in order to boost new kinds of interactions and serendipitous moments. Besides this, some of the huts’ walls are appropriable (whiteboard, cabinet of curiosity, brandable interfaces etc.) allowing the collaborators to use them freely and integrate them in their work dynamics,” says Studio Banana