Sustainably furnished meeting environment for Waterschap Hollandse Delta I Gispen

Together with Waterschap Hollandse Delta (Dutch water authority), Gispen has created a multi-functional and modern meeting environment for different types of consultation. We provided the interior design from floor to ceiling and completely furnished the office space. No less than 80% of the furniture are refurbished items from our Circular Hub. The remaining 20% consist of reused items that come straight from the water authority’s own stock plus a number of new, circular items. A textbook example of sustainability.

SUSTAINABLE AND CIRCULAR

Waterschap Hollandse Delta is committed to providing sufficient amounts of clean water as well as sturdy dykes and safe roads and waterways on the South Holland Islands. In addition to its many outdoor sites, Ridderkerk is home to its headquarters, where they establish policies. This involves much consultation, which is exactly where they needed a hand. The head office suffered from a lack of space for meetings. An adjacent warehouse provided a solution. The ground floor serves as storage space for materials and equipment. Above it, on the first floor, Gispen and the water authority transformed a severely outdated office space into a modern, multi-functional environment for different types of consultation. Client Willem Verder, senior building manager at Waterschap Hollandse Delta: 'An important starting point was to make everything sustainable and circular. For our furniture inventory, we use a circular ladder that ranges from reuse to maintenance and refurbishment. And if we need to buy a new product, it has to be as sustainable as possible. It was with this in mind that we also wanted to look at the furniture of our new meeting environment, called the Schap. Gispen was able to respond to this perfectly through its Circular Hub.'

NEW LAYOUT, COLOURS AND MATERIALS

Egbert Bos, senior account manager at Gispen: 'We provided a floor-to-ceiling interior design in close consultation with Willem. The challenge was to create the requested modern meeting environment with as few structural modifications as possible. We came up with a clever new layout and presented a proposal for colours and materials'. The Schap now offers space for all sorts of meetings: from large consultations to small informal meetings, and from team meetings to calls. There are high and low seating solutions, agile workstations, project rooms and a silent room for ultimate focus. Willem: 'Reuse was paramount in everything. Walls have been removed and installed elsewhere. Ceiling tiles were taken out and reused. The new floor covering proposed by Gispen was made from 92.7% recycled and bio-based materials. And the furniture had to be equally sustainable.'

REUSED STRAIGHT FROM STOCK

Egbert: Furniture that is reused and comes directly from your own stock is the most sustainable solution, which is where we start. A series of chairs from the head office has been given a new home at the Schap. We also furnished all the conference rooms with refurbished products from our Circular Hub, sourced from other clients. Meaning all workstations, office chairs, conference tables and conference chairs.' These include refurbished sit/stand desks, A230 office chairs, conference chairs and conference tables as well as Artifort conference chairs.

We also sourced S and U-shaped Gispen HUGG collaborative workstations from the Hub. Additionally, a number of new items have been supplied consisting of sustainable materials. Notably Gispen Sett CE sofas featuring fully-recycled plastic frames, Ubu chairs by Planq – made of plastic derived from large batches of old textiles – and special footstools which still show the rough finish and edges of their original materials.

CO2-REDUCTION OF 5,590 KILOGRAMS

The combined use of these refurbished products, which carry the Gispen REVIVED label, has resulted in a CO2-reduction of 5,590 kilograms in comparison to new furniture. This is equivalent to driving an average car 32,420 kilometres or flying from Amsterdam to Paris 39 times.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE RESULT?

Willem: 'Our new meeting environment is very popular. This is also thanks to the new facilities such as the lecture room that can hold up to 50 people. We simply don't have that kind of space at the head office. As of the beginning of this year, the head office is even completely closed on Fridays, drawing employees to the Schap. This, in turn, saves us energy. Meanwhile, we have made another small adjustment; additional workstations have been added to a library that was underused. This is how flexible you need to be, and Gispen is just that. The interior and atmosphere of the Schap are so good that it has led to an additional request for a redesign of the interior of the head office as well. We are now taking this under consideration – again based on reuse, of course.'

Egbert Bos - senior account manager at Gispen

A word from the specialist

'Working with Willem has contributed to achieving the sustainable ambitions of the water authority. With a result that speaks for itself: 80% of the furniture is refurbished, 10% is new and sustainable and 10% is reused. The colour schemes and materials fit in with the natural, green surroundings of the water authority. The acoustics have also been taken into account, with wall-filling visuals that provide a dampening effect.'

‘THE NEW INTERIOR AND ATMOSPHERE ARE SUCH A SUCCESS THAT WE ARE NOW THINKING OF GIVING OUR HEAD OFFICE THE SAME TREATMENT.'

Willem Verder Senior building manager at Waterschap Hollandse Delta

portrait of klantfoto waterschap hollandse delta

Willem Verder - Senior building manager at Waterschap Hollandse Delta

THE CLIENT’S THOUGHTS

The Circular Hub enables Gispen to supply large numbers of refurbished pieces of furniture. Sustainably refurnishing an entire floor? Gispen considers this an exciting challenge. Working with them was great and we are very pleased with the end result. When people think second-hand, they often think thrift store, but at our new meeting venue they can't tell the difference from new. Everything feels like new. And it basically is.