Learning From The Best: IFMA Houston Award Winning Best Practices

When Page decided to renovate its downtown Houston office to accommodate a growing staff count – but keep to a fixed floor space – the firm initially didn’t realize how much attention the project would receive. In December, the International Facilities Management Association (IFMA) Houston Chapter presented the project the Award for Best Practices, Small Projects Category. Since then, other firms, clients and media have been fascinated by the planning and analytics that resulted in Page Houston v2.0.

At its May luncheon, IFMA Houston asked Page Principal / Interior Architecture Director Marissa Yu to speak about the project alongside the award-winning firm for the Medium Projects Category. For both projects, the audience was most interested in how companies address change and change management through facility design. Marissa explained, "For Page Houston, the transition to a smaller individual footprint, offset by the introduction of a variety of shared collaboration spaces and resource centers led to a workplace that accommodates new work styles and future growth." The firm is completing a post-occupancy evaluation and hopes to learn and share more metrics and insight about the project soon.

Last fall, the Page Houston office sponsored the IFMA Houston Chapter’s continuing education program and shared what’s now being referred to as The Workers’ Future Place. Facility managers from Fortune 500 companies came to hear about the design process, take away learnings for their own facilities and tour the new space for themselves. When it was completed earlier in the year, Texas Architect Magazine promptly featured it in a recurring section called Step Into My Office that spotlights significant workplaces around the state.