UniCredit offices

AMDL CIRCLE has designed the interiors of the new UniCredit business complex in Verona, inside the former Magazzini, in buildings 23 and 24 restructured by Mario Botta, who has been responsible for the upgrading of the entire area.
The entrance gallery is a large covered plaza occupying the full height of the space between the two buildings. It is an ideal continuation of the public space and acts as an interface between the bank and the general public; for this reason, in addition to hosting the reception desk, it has been designed for the organisation of exhibitions and events and has graphic elements for group communication.
Inside the buildings, 800 workstations are distributed over three storeys and accommodate 900 employees involved in a smart working project. The adoption of this managerial philosophy involves the definition of the spaces, the layout of which has a significant impact on work and can favour people’s flexibility and wellbeing. Smart working must support the balance between working life and social life and it is necessary to transcend the traditional concepts of private office, personal desk and fixed position, but also that of open space, to favour the diversification of the shared areas.
In the new offices, people are free to choose the workstation they like most for their activity from among the four types of spaces. The Homebase, for individual work, is arranged with tables organised into six terminals. The Focus Area, acoustically insulated, is devoted to work requiring deep thought and concentration. The Co-Working Area is designed for group work and is organised around large tables with integrated technology, allowing the sharing of laptops. Office & Meet is an office assigned to an executive, which can be used as a meeting room in the absence of the person responsible. In addition to the workstations, there are spaces prepared devoted to collaborative activities (Communication Area), meeting rooms for a maximum of 10 people (Meeting Rooms) and meeting rooms for a maximum of 3 people (Flexi Rooms). Soundproofed spaces have been created (Phone Booths) for phone calls and conference calls, plus a kitchen is present on each floor for breaks in work, while the Functional Areas are support areas with printers, lockers, archives and pigeonholes for mail and a cloakroom. The Agora is a small, technological, informal wooden pavilion, suitable for the organisation of brainstorming sessions.
The cavedium of building 23 has been repurposed as an auditorium for the group’s internal events; it is fitted with an oak wood escalator, which can be dismantled and reassembled for the occasion. Facing onto the space are six oak bow windows, creating informal, well-lit and flexible spaces for having a conversation with a colleague or a customer.
The furnishing system, mainly birch wood, has come about from an analysis of new working methods. In collaboration with Unifor, a steel modular frame has been designed to create the framework for various desks, which are differentiated from the standard 160×80 cm format, without using intermediary support legs. The frame, endowed with holes with rack-and-pinion, allows the installation of various elements (shelves, multimedia screens and acoustic panels) and the integration of technological arms, wiring and cables, freeing up the surface of the workstation top. Various dividing glass screens and fabric acoustic panels can be mounted onto the frame for the workstations used for work requiring concentration.