Melbourne CBD to get its own timber workshop

But office workstations are only a minor part in the next iteration of CBD space that aims to make collaboration easier and faster between the Bendigo-based designer and supplier of panels and facades and the construction-industry clients who commission and use them.

“They can bring their clients and we can work through a solution to a project together,” Sculptform managing director Jeremy Napier said.

“It really speeds up the loop of design, develop, prototype, approve or reiterate. It speeds up the process for them tremendously.”

The Woods Bagot-designed Co-Lab is not the first inner-city space for suppliers, clients and consumers to meet. Brickworks already has “design studio” showrooms in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and Hobart designed by Red Design Group.

But while the Sculptform facility – in a location chosen for its proximity to the company’s major architecture firm clients – will also have facilities to show samples of wood and finishes, it is more a practical working environment for collaboration.

In one section of the space divided by a large staircase, Sculptform will install a workshop with bandsaws, planing and sanding equipment that is visible to all inside and outside the building – like a glassed-off kitchen in full display to the diners in a restaurant. It will also have meeting areas, a showroom, cafe and auditorium for functions or events.

The space will contain only about 10 workstations for a handful of Sculptform’s 55 staff and so bucks the growing trend of tighter workspace-desk ratios in CBD real estate, said Bruno Mendes, the Woods Bagot architect designing the space.

“If you approached it traditionally, you could do this out of a 3 metre by 3 metre tiny hole in the wall like a little shop,” Mr Mendes said.

“But the way they’re tackling it is fantastic. They’re really celebrating the thing that is unique to them.”

It’s an expensive celebration. Sculptform consulted with two of its biggest clients – Cox Architecture and Woods Bagot – on the space and asked both to submit designs in a paid competition. Woods Bagot got the nod. By project-managing its own fitout, Sculptform has brought the estimated $2500-per-square-metre down cost down to between $1500 to $2000, but even so, it is a gamble.

“It’s a bit of a leap for us, a bit of a moonshot, but you’ve got to do something different in order to grow your business,” Mr Napier said.

While the regional building industry supplier wants to create a CBD presence that will provide a venue for clients and other people to gather, its five-year lease on a blended gross rent between $700 and $750 per square metre – between lower-value office rents and higher-value retail rents – also suits the strategy of building owner Fidinam to reposition the 14-level tower.

Sculptform has taken over a space previously used by outsourced corporate training provider Training Choice and the new tenancy was part of the stated strategy of its Swiss-based owner to take the building up-market, Savills leasing agent Charlie Betts said.

“We wouldn’t look at doing just commercial office space on that floor,” Mr Betts said. “We’re trying to reposition the building in the best light. It’s very much a destination tenancy.”

The Co-Lab is due to open early next year, to coincide with the time its clients come back from their summer breaks, Mr Napier said.

“We’re aiming for the end of January when the architects and builders finish their holidays and come back to focus on work again,” he said.