Newell Brands

Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center Newell Brands Corporate Design Center
New Corporate Design Center

Award Winning Project

  • 2016 ALA Silver Medal Design Award
  • 2016 AIA Michigan Honor Award
  • 2015 AIA Chicago Interior Architecture Award Citation of Merit
  • Green Building Institute TWO GREEN GLOBES Certified Building
  • Contract Magazine Interiors Awards 2016: Office: Large

Project Publication

Design Program: 

Situated on a 5.3 acre site, the project scope included the creation of 40,000 square feet of new state of the art corporate design center. The new facility was designed to house all corporate design and engineering functions for Newell Brands product design and prototyping. The space plan development required the facility to be broken into three main functions: common spaces, general office space, and specialized spaces. The program required the incorporation of public usability labs and conference rooms, general office areas, private immersion rooms for each market sector, materials library, multi-purpose rooms, and an open shop area for prototype creation. Each of these areas were required to provide additional common space for casual encounter and collaboration area for break-out sessions amongst designers. The facility was required to be flexible and adaptable yet scaled in a manner to create a sense of place.

Design Challenges:

Close coordination was required with the Owner and Contractor as a result of the project being schedule and budget driven by the client. The balance between square footage, design requirements, and aesthetic created the need to explore the use of a pre-engineered metal building shell. To accommodate budget while still obtaining an aesthetically pleasing facility, the pre-engineered metal building was clad with horizontal metal siding, large punched window openings for natural light, large skylights, and full height precast panels along the base of the structure and at the entry point. In addition to schedule and budget, the design team was challenged with the goal of achieving Green Globes Certification. This required a high level of design evaluation in an attempt to achieve a high level of design while continuing to be budget driven.