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Workspots getting elegant
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The right ambience and office dιcor can bring out the best in employees. Neat office interiors are necessary to retain quality manpower.
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What is the most striking feature of any modern office? It is the interiors, which speak volumes of the health of the office and compels customers to visit the office again and again. Not long ago, the very thought of Government offices brought to mind images of old tables piled up with files, rickety chairs, dusty racks and open shelves and almirahs, which were often used as partitions.
That is a thing of the past. Now, even the public sector and Government offices are vying with their private counterparts in providing the right ambience to attract more customers.
The modular furniture or the open office systems offer several advantages over their conventional cousins like flexibility, provision for concealed power and telephone cables and the convenience of detaching and transporting to a new place within hours.
There is a huge awareness and preference for having a very fine living and working atmosphere. Unlike the past, when the emphasis of the business-class and entrepreneurs was on accumulation of assets and wealth, they are now pumping in more resources to create the right office ambience. The buying power of the middle class has also increased and they are willing to shell out more money to live and work in style. The modular panels and partitions are provided by manufacturers like Godrej, Featherlite, Jassani's, Blowplast and Kirloskar as `knocked down' furniture.
"Neatly done office interiors have become more of a necessity to retain quality human resources and for the clients at large. The employers can no longer take the risk of losing their manpower to better-equipped offices, which provide a neat ambience and comfort to their employees," says the chief designer of Etcetra Interiors, R. Govind.
"Thanks to the Internet, we can access the developments across the globe and can improvise and revolutionise the workspaces. Dynamic colour schemes, innovative materials and unconventional detailing form part of the present trends and preferences. The interiors should energise the environment and thankfully, even the old-fashioned people are adapting to the changes in design."
"The clients give us details of the available space and their requirements and we do the entire designing and execution of the work. Every square inch of space is expensive these days and one cannot afford waste on this count. It is here that the efficiency and competence of a designer can work wonders for the clients," he says.
Etcetra Interiors has done the interiors for the Eastern Power Distribution Company Limited (EPDCL) call centre. This reflects the change in the thinking of the public sector undertakings and how they are becoming more and more customer-oriented. Etcetra has also furnished the interiors for Thomas Cook Travels, Dwarakanagar, Iquara Broadband, an Internet service provider, the ICICI PFS office at Siripuram Fort, the ICICI branch at Dwarakanagar and in Vijayawada and some of the offices at the Visakhapatnam Special Economic Zone. "All these have been designed and meticulously carried out to match international standards," says Mr. Govind.
"It is enough for a client to tell us the space available and his requirements, we will do the rest right from designing to furnishing of the office. Modular furniture is the in-thing in modern offices as they can be detached and transported within hours. Similarly, it is easy to make extensions and have partitions in different designs and heights," says the managing partner of Featherlite, K.V. Srinivas.
"We provide matching racks and drawers to suit the tables. Clients sometimes seek imported furniture for the guest rooms and waiting rooms," he says.
Blowplast of VIP moulded luggage fame, provides total interior solutions to meet office needs, says the sales in charge of the company, Babu Rao. However, our particle blocks and running tables are the most sought after by our clients who include nationalised banks and the public sector, National Mineral Development Corporation, he says.
"Modular furniture is the most sought after these days as it is available in a wide range and at affordable price, has an elegant finish and eliminates problems usually associated with individual carpenters. They do not require any maintenance as they are pre-laminated," says A. Jawahar, the branch in charge of the Style Spa showroom at Ramnagar.
Coming to cabinets, the three-celled wooden racks, which are more elegant, are much sought after by private companies. However, Government organisations still prefer the old iron racks, he says. Style Spa, which is a member of the K.K. Birla Group, imports raw material from different parts of the world and manufactures the furniture at its factory in Chennai. Its clients for workstations and chairs include Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited, National Aluminium Company Limited and Hindustan Shipyard Limited.
"We provide office tables and chairs, filing cabinets in different colours and designs but in standard sizes. However, the project-based modular furniture requires customisation and is mostly met by manufacturers who specialise in them," says the director of Truzo, Rajiv Agarwal.
The pioneer in modular furniture, Godrej, has a whole range of ergonomically designed furniture to suit the varied needs of offices. The work surfaces and partitions are available in different heights, colours and shapes. The company has in-house designers, who provide design assistance for layout creations using 3-D software. Some of the products can be seen at the Godrej showroom at LIC Building.
B MADHU GOPAL
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