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Napier Park is more than a global alternative asset management firm. Its team is founded on close relationships between colleagues and decades of experience operating in global markets. Napier Park celebrate a culture which is welcoming, committed, and always puts the client first, and its new office needed to become a physical manifestation of these values.
The company commissioned Peldon Rose to provide a full strip out, CAT A, and CAT B refurbishment on the fifth floor of 5 Hanover Square, a statement building in the heart of Mayfair. This mixed-use development, offering high quality office-space, retail space, and five apartments, stands out for its sustainable foundations and its modern twist on the traditional Georgian buildings overlooking Hanover Square.
Furniture from the likes of Task Systems gives the library a feeling of luxury and corporate comfort, the perfect facilitator for company meetings
As soon as you step out of the lifts and onto the fifth floor, Napier Park’s brand presence is strong. A backlit metal joinery wall, cut with lasers into the pattern of the Napier “knot”, provides the backdrop to entrance seating in Napier Park’s navy brand colours. Installing the lighting behind this wall involved hundreds of dimmable LED lights which sit behind a diffuser screen, which in turn sits behind the laser cut metal panel. Dimmable lights provide opportunity to set the mood to suit the event, whether it be working throughout the day or client entertaining in the evening.
A lounge-like waiting area encourages visitors to make the most of the arrival experience. This setting, complete with velvet sofas atop a plush rug, and a sideboard finished in the same walnut veneer that features holistically throughout the office, forms the focal point of the meeting suite.
Walking across the real stone floor towards the entrance into the main office space, you can stop and take a look at Napier’s awards cabinet which celebrates the accomplishments of the business, and its employees. It was important to the business that these achievements were embedded in the new design, and on show for visitors to see.
When I first saw Peldon Rose’s design, I was immediately taken aback by its originality and visual elegance. The creation process started from an understanding and intuition of our personality, style, and aspiration, through just a few anecdotes. Combined with the study of the space, light, and materials, creativity took off to finally result in the ambience we desired.
Napier Park wanted a space that would be instantly warm and welcoming to clients and other visitors; and to also be a home for its employees. As such, the workplace design is centred around a hospitality look and feel. The space is at once one of practicality, of comfort, and of understated luxury with plush furnishings and high-end finishes.
Weekly all-company meetings take place in the library – a place for forum-like discussions, complete with a large bookcase and award shelves, upholstered lounge seating, and a fireplace which uses water vapour to create the effect of fire within the limitations of building regulations. Installing the Dimplex 1000 cassette involved a high degree of coordination between contractors and suppliers. The library ceiling panelling perfectly aligns with the full height bookcase, incorporating the clean lines synonymous with much of the surrounding Georgian architecture.
Special fabric ceiling panels absorb excess sound. They have the ability to swing down over the meeting room table to create a seamless meeting experience for employees and clients
The practical nature of the office is encapsulated in the open-plan desking area. Far from saturated with desks, this space is dynamic and acoustically optimised. Planter shelves double as storage cabinets. A high-table collaboration area enables colleagues to step away from their desks to solve problems, and inspire one another. Choice in how and where to work underpins many workplace design decisions today; agility is here, and Napier Park have chosen to embrace it. Finally, the periphery of the office is occupied by zoom rooms and executive offices, enriched with walnut-veneer doors, and online booking systems.
The kitchen is for the community. Breakfast stools line a large stone-topped island unit built on sage-green joinery. Colleagues can work here, or take a proper break from their working day for a bite of lunch or cup of coffee. Tucked away from the rest of the desking, the area once again considers how to optimise acoustics within an office setting. And it’s full of surprises! A secret hidden door in the walnut veneer closets enables colleagues to cut right back into the office’s arrival area and exit if they’d like, rather than travelling through the access doors and the entire floorplate.
Peldon Rose’s execution capability is unparalleled: construction, technology, furniture selection, managing challenges with landlord, every aspect of the project was taken care of with outstanding quality.
Thousands of dimmable LED lights sit behind a bespoke joinery diffuser screen cut into the shape of the Napier "knot"
Awards and company trinkets are proudly on display in this shelving unit, visible for all to see first entering the office
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