AT A GLANCE
A circular blueprint: Extensive material reuse sets a high benchmark for low-carbon design.
People first: flipping the floorplan inside-out grants everyone natural light and fluid movement.
A new identity: Celebrating heritage while feeling welcoming, warm and modern.
The transformation of Allens Melbourne from a traditional legal office to a warm, future-focused workplace built largely from reused materials and refurbished furniture, began with a cultural exploration. Before the first floorplans were drawn, our workplace strategy team asked the firm’s staff a simple question: How do you actually want to work? The answer was a collective call to create a workplace that enables greater collaboration.
The result has proven so effective it’s become the blueprint for what comes next — from Allens’ upcoming Perth expansion to its recently completed, Hassell-designed workplace inside 33 Alfred Street, Sydney’s heritage-listed first skyscraper.
A DEMOCRACY OF DAYLIGHT
One of the most striking gestures of the new design is a ‘people first’ strategy, where the floorplan was flipped inside-out. By removing all fixed elements from the building’s perimeter, the design team ensured that natural light and views out to the city was available for everyone.
This shift in geography has had a positive impact on the firm’s social chemistry. The new central café serves as a key connector, encouraging informal conversation between departments and providing an inviting space for informal client meetings. Lawyers now meet clients over a flat white in the café rather than booking a meeting room.
THE CIRCULAR BLUEPRINT
Prioritising a low-carbon reality, our design team opted for a rigorous commitment to material reuse. The project achieved a notable result in circularity by refurbishing or reusing 33% of the firm’s existing furniture, avoiding the waste of a typical corporate fit-out.
This ethos extends to the structural details: timber wall battens from the previous interior were reclaimed and repurposed into a feature ceiling. By reviving original timber floors and retaining steel elements — including workstation legs and monitor arms — the design integrates the firm’s existing resources into a modern, functional environment.
AUTONOMY AND THE NEURODIVERSE LENS
Recognising the diversity of the modern workforce, the new interior was engineered with a keen eye toward inclusivity and neurodiversity. It’s an environment, which acknowledges that productivity is not one-size-fits-all and requires a spectrum of sensory control.
On every floor, staff are given the choice between collaborative hubs and quiet focus sanctuaries, and a physical environment that can be manually adjusted. In a nod to a more home-like environment, staff can manually draw the sheer curtains that line the building’s perimeter to soften the Australian sun.
This shift toward a more personal, human-scale atmosphere is a top priority for employees worldwide, as highlighted in Hassell’s recent Workplace Futures survey.
The Allens Melbourne reinvention is a sophisticated, staged transformation that remained operational throughout — a ‘live-site’ feat that successfully reconciles the firm’s two-century heritage with a low-carbon, human-scale future.
