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Ad agency Porter/Novelli's new Manhattan headquarters unifies both space and staff.
LW International, an architecture and design firm in New York, faced an interesting challenge in the spring of 1997. Advertising and PR firm Porter/Novelli, a subsidiary of Omnicom, hired HLW to create its new headquarters on the eighth floor of 220 East 42nd in Manhattan, the former Daily News building. The challenge lay in creating a space that would allow Porter/Novelli to operate as a unified whole and project stability while remaining flexible enough to change as the firm's needs changed.
Porter/Novelli's move from its former offices at 437 Madison Ave. was part of Omnicom's efforts to bring its smaller marketing firms under one roof. Omnicom leased approximately 220,000 sq.ft. of the 37-floor landmark Daily News building from real estate magnate Steve Witkoff, who bought it for $101 million in 1996. According to one source, Witkoff was renting space in the high $20-per-sq.ft. range. For the 50,000-sq.ft. Porter/Novelli headquarters, interviews with designers were held in December 1996, the contract was awarded in late January, construction started that Spring, and the agency relocated in early September 1997.
Porter/Novelli had grown to more than 200 employees while undergoing an internal restructuring that further fueled the need to reorganize and relocate. Designing a space that would bring together a growing, restructured staff was a top priority.
In addition to the staff, the space itself required a unifying element. The building is actually made up of three buildings, the oldest of which was constructed in the 1930s. Each of the three areas has its own dimensions, window designs, and column widths.
Susan Boyle, senior partner and director of interior architecture at HLW, summed up the problem: "How do you make this floor with all these strange...