Crafting a stunning wellness suite for one of Europe’s largest parcel delivery businesses

Scott: “I’ve worked with DPD for many years and have completed projects across the full spectrum – from purely practical concepts that suit a market-leading logistics operation through to bespoke furniture for the executive suite. This project was different in that the solution itself was likely to lead to a positive change in working practices for the team. Put simply, the client asked us to find a way to offer all colleagues somewhere to rest and recharge that was inviting but more than just a break area.

Rather than start with requesting “can you build us some Wellness pods?”, we were tasked with finding a solution that benefitted everyone at certain DPD depots with absolutely no preconceived ideas. One of the challenges was that we were looking to add this facility to five depots across the Midlands and each of these had a different footprint and availability of space. We wanted to avoid simply partitioning existing offices and we also aimed to provide flexibility and futureproofing to give longevity to whatever we came up with.”

Fernanda: “My initial task was to really get under the skin of how the team members would use a Wellness area. What was so exciting was that the team commissioning this project were going to benefit as well, so every conversation we had was directly relevant to the solution because we were always talking to a potential beneficiary.

The brief was very clear – that this was to be somewhere positive for everyone from the drivers to the office team, in a business that comes to life between 6pm and 3am. What it wasn’t to be was somewhere to have a nap or a bite to eat – we were hoping to support productivity!
Texture was super-important to this; in a business that is highly organised and mechanised, providing something that genuinely catered to human needs was called for. So our initial designs focused on earthy, comforting tones and natural fabric textures from everything from the soft seating to the flooring.”

Scott: “Because we had to factor in both flexibility and a solution that worked in five distinct locations, we decided to work with the UK’s leading manufacturer of pods for the office environment, Senator UK.

When you mention the word “pods” to many people, they simply think of the very common privacy pods that became popular a few years ago that are about the size of a phone box but what we came up with here are very different. Fully integrated into power/ lighting (as you can see in our photos of the top of the pods) and sprinkler systems but also completely flexible in location, these double-glazed Wellness pods we have created for DPD are acoustically sound with the opportunity for interior design as needed. We’ve created formal boardrooms in these products previously but here we looked to create something relatively informal.

In the future, should DPD want to relocate any of the pods we’ve installed, our team can simply move them so nothing will be wasted and the whole pod and its contents will be demounted and repositioned.

Fernanda: “The final design involved “pops” of DPD’s red in the soft seating and then we picked up on the connection between Wellness and organic textures with a jute rug and natural fibres in fabric plus wooden side tables. Unusually, we used preserved plants to continue the feel of bringing the outside world into the working day (or night). The modular seating we used is infinitely customisable depending on where the team want to sit.

Our colour palette changed subtly from the initial design so that we introduced more variations on the earthy/ mushroom tones – the final touch was a set of sheer curtains in a tonal sage green that gave optional privacy to users but maintained the natural look and field.”