When subscription pet-product company BarkBox opted in late 2021 to move its offices from SoHo to the Financial District, its employees pushed for a whimsical, dog-friendly space that would be colorful, casual and fun.
“They wanted to hide 50 drawings of squirrels around the office for visitors to find,” said Lon Skidds, Executive Vice President at MKDA who worked on the project and noted that the office included themed conference rooms such as the “420 Burrito Room” and the “Pigs in a Blanket Room.”
“In this specific project it was about wellness for the dogs as well,” explained Edin Rudic, Executive Creative Director at MKDA. “The choice of materials had to be cleanable, wipe-able, dog-friendly. With these tech-like spaces where there’s lots of hard surfaces, noise becomes an issue. To mitigate the noise we had to bring in absorbing soft materials such as these lamps [in the elevator lobby] and introduce them on the ceiling, not the floor.”