Details of new London workplace concept Twentytwo have been revealed – and it’s wooing thrill-seeking entrepreneurs with the city’s first ever ‘climbing window’.
Adventurous employees will be able to spend their lunch break climbing glass walls inside the 62-storey skyscraper, 125-m above the ground. The climbing window is the centrepiece of fitness facilities at the heart of office building at 22 Bishopsgate, which is being developed by AXA IM Real Assets and Lipton Rogers Developments with a ‘wellness’ bent.
‘We recognise the role of the office has changed, with workplaces now needing to do so much more than simply accommodate people,’ says Sir Stuart Lipton, partner at Lipton Rogers Developments. ‘They are becoming hubs for bringing colleagues together – “high-tech coffee shops” where people meet, share, collaborate and develop ideas, strategies and solutions.’
Lipton adds: ‘Twentytwo will be a truly “social” workplace with different spaces for people to socialise, focus and energise. It represents how we will all be working in the future.’
Designed by PLP Architecture, 22 Bishopsgate will contain workspace for 12,000 people, as well as a fresh food market, innovation hub, gym, wellbeing retreat and spa, business club and cycle hub, and London’s highest free public viewing gallery. Down on the ground, workers will also be able to enjoy an ‘art walk’ in the building’s triple-height lobby.
Twentytwo – which clocks up 1.275 million sq ft of office space for a mix of small and large businesses, as well as start-ups – will be among the tallest buildings in the capital’s financial district when it is developed, on land previously earmarked for Pinnacle Tower.
Don’t dust off your climbing shoes just yet though – it’s not scheduled for completion until summer 2019.
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