Beta house sets the tone for the future of Campus Luleå

The renovation of the Beta House was completed last fall and now the university can proudly present a new reference point for the future Campus Luleå.

Luleå University of Technology wants to be an attractive workplace with modern working environments. The pandemic created a lasting change in behaviour, as many employees work from home up to half of the working hours. In 2020, the university decided that in new production and renovations, office premises should, where possible, be designed as activity-based offices.

The aim is to design new types of office workplaces that are flexible and have access to different types of environments that support different types of work needs. One success factor is not to copy someone else's solution but to adapt it to the activities to be carried out in the environment.

- Activity-based work increases the opportunities for employees to vary and determine their work. It also provides greater flexibility for employers to adapt premises to fewer or more employees. "The workplaces are adapted to different needs and this provides the opportunity to sit in an individual focus room or together with colleagues, depending on which task you are focusing on at the moment," says Jennie Hägg Wilhelmsson, Head of Student, Researcher and Education Support, who has 80 employees working in the Beta House.

"I feel such peace"

The activity-based Beta House is divided into four different zones. There is an active zone, a semi-zone, a quiet zone and focus rooms and meeting rooms. There are a large number of permanent workplaces with associated meeting rooms and a wide range of support areas based on the activity-based concept.

Emma Gröndal is a study counsellor at Luleå University of Technology and shows us the premises. She says that working in an activity-based office gives her both freedom and variety in her professional role.

"This work environment makes you feel so good. I feel such peace every time I come to work. It makes you happy and makes you lower your shoulders a bit. It's an incredibly cosy and pleasant working environment. I think the work environment is very important and I've never felt as good as I do here!"

"We have a balanced approach"

When you enter the Beta building, you are reassured by the subdued environment and the soft beige colors that decorate the corridors. Project manager Lars Bergman explains how the project has approached the design of the environment.

"We have taken a balanced approach, so that the surfaces and the environment are sustainable over time and not dependent on trends. For example, it is easier to change accent tones on small interior details. That's why the office spaces are fairly neutral: beige, light tones in curtains, white wall color, light office tables, while the carpets stand out in color/zoning."

Focus on reuse

Meeting rooms and small workspaces, however, have a different, bolder color tone, with dark tones on walls, suspended light fixtures in fine design and murky tones in textile carpets. Already in the process of designing the Beta House, a number of lessons have been learned that the project is taking forward:

"We have had a strong focus on reuse and we have tried to think long-term in how we built lighting, we have a strong focus on good acoustics in all areas," explains Lars Bergman.

While the Beta house has been rebuilt, the university has developed a design manual, which provide clear guiding in the design of the university's future environments.

"The goal has been to create a more robust, playful and inspiring design manual, which can serve as a practical and tangible tool in the design of the university's future environments. This is so that project managers and the business, together with architects, interior designers and the university's subcontractors, will create interiors and environments that are in line with the university's wishes for an attractive, long-term sustainable, inviting, homely and technically updated campus. The university's Design Manual is intended as an aid to design work at the university. The conditions of the room, the existing architecture, light conditions, flows, the university's graphic profile, sustainability issues and more should always be taken into account in every change, small or large" says Lars Bergman.

Take a tour of the university in the Beta house in the video below.

• We are building the university of thefuture
  Together with Akademiska hus, the university is taking a holistic approach to future-proof all buildings on the campus in Luleå.