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Thursday, August 26, 2021
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Business|Offices Dangle Beehives and Garden Plots to Coax Workers Back

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/business/return-to-office.html
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OFFICES DANGLE BEEHIVES AND GARDEN PLOTS TO COAX WORKERS BACK

The latest perks include harvesting honey and digging in the dirt, part of a
growing effort to give employees access to fresh air, sunlight and plants.

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Nicholas Cervantes Jr. and Leta Selmanovic attending to the bees on a terrace of
730 Third Avenue, an office tower in Manhattan.Credit...Hilary Swift for The New
York Times

By Jane Margolies

Aug. 25, 2021

The investment company Nuveen has spent $120 million renovating its office tower
at 730 Third Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, overhauling the lobby, devoting the
second floor to amenities and refurbishing a 22nd-floor terrace.

And the finishing touch? Two beehives on a seventh-floor terrace.

Following the latest trend in office perks, Nuveen hired a beekeeper to teach
tenants about their tiny new neighbors and harvest honey for them to take home.

“In conversations with tenants, I get more questions about that than anything
else,” said Brian Wallick, Nuveen’s director of New York office and life science
investments.

Office workers who were sent home during pandemic lockdowns often sought refuge
in nature, tending to houseplants, setting up bird feeders and sitting outdoors
with their laptops. Now, as companies try to coax skittish employees back to the
office and building owners compete for tenants when vacancy rates are soaring,
many have hit on the idea of making the office world feel more like the natural
world.



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The effort seeks to give office workers access to fresh air, sunlight and
plants, in tune with the concept of biophilia, which says humans have an innate
connection with nature. Designs that include nature are shown to promote health
and wellness.

Some of the more unusual nature-themed offering include “treehouse” lounges and
vegetable plots that let desk workers dig in the dirt. Beekeeping programs —
complete with honey tastings and name-your-queen contests — are, ahem, all the
buzz. One upcoming project in Texas will include a bird blind, allowing workers
to peek out at other winged creatures.


Image

The hives were installed by Alvéole, a Montreal company whose revenue has soared
666 percent during the pandemic.Credit...Hilary Swift for The New York Times

“There’s a lot more focus on amenities and how to make an office better than
working from your dining room table,” said Richard A. Cook, a founding partner
at CookFox Architects.

Some companies say nature-centered amenities have won them over. And some
workers find the outdoorsy vibe reassuring.



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But it is unclear whether nature will be enough to attract tenants after the
success of remote work over the past year and a half. Some companies have
already shrunk their office space, and many employees, having ably performed
their duties from home, are questioning the need to go into an office at all.
The surge in coronavirus cases from the spread of the Delta variant has caused
some companies, like Amazon, Apple and Facebook, to postpone their return to the
office to next year.

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Two weeks ago, office buildings in 10 major metropolitan areas were 32 percent
occupied, down slightly from the week before, according to Kastle Systems, a
security company.

Incorporating nature in office buildings is not entirely new. Before the
pandemic, developers, owners and architects were already adding terraces and
rooftop lounges and bringing plants and natural light inside — part of a drive
to make offices healthier. Scientific studies show that biophilic spaces are
associated with increased cognition and productivity, lower stress levels, fewer
sick days and less staff turnover.

But now a connection to nature has gone from being “a nice-to-have to being a
risk if you don’t do it,” said Joanna Frank, the president and chief executive
of the Center for Active Design, which operates Fitwel, a healthy-building
certification program.

Adding natural features to offices can be expensive, but the costs can often be
offset with higher rents. Commercial buildings with healthy-building
certifications (such as Fitwel and the Well standard, administered by the
International Well Building Institute) can fetch rents up to 7.7 percent higher
than noncertified buildings, according to a recent study by the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.


Image

The 22nd-floor terrance at 730 Third Avenue is being refurbished.Credit...Hilary
Swift for The New York Times

The most widespread change in office buildings since the pandemic is a focus on
improving indoor air. Building owners and managers, responding to tenants’
demand for assurances that the office air is safe, upgraded filters and
increased the air replacement rate.



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Beacon Capital Partners brought more fresh air into its buildings on advice from
Harvard’s School of Public Health, said Alfred Scaramelli, a managing director
who oversees facilities operations. Pumping in more outdoor air uses 6 to 7
percent more energy, though.

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Beacon Capital is also experimenting with portable filtration devices in common
areas “to add a little bit of emotional comfort to people using the fitness
center or conference room or a tenant lounge that the air is ultraclean,” Mr.
Scaramelli said.

Some landlords are reporting air quality data directly to occupants via monitors
and apps. Sterling Bay has enrolled three of its properties in a certification
program named Reset Air. Sensors attached to HVAC units track levels of carbon
dioxide, among other things, with the data displayed on screens throughout the
buildings.

The push is helping to alleviate workers’ concerns. Joyce Poole, a senior
director at LendingTree, a fintech company based in Charlotte, N.C., feels
confident enough in her company’s new headquarters that she has started going
into the office three days a week.


Image

One of the “treehouse” lounges in LendingTree’s new headquarters in Charlotte,
N.C.Credit...LendingTree

Each floor has an airy “treehouse” lounge with a pitched trellis overhead and
greenery-filled planters. And from one of the meeting rooms where she often
takes calls, basking in sunlight from floor-to-ceiling windows, she can see
window boxes full of plants doing their bit to clean the air.

“When I see the plants, I think, ‘That’s good,’” Mrs. Poole said.

Buildings around the country are also making it possible for occupants to inhale
fresh air outdoors, where they can work, socialize or take a yoga class.



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In Tampa, Fla., Thousand & One, a new office building from Strategic Property
Partners that was designed by CookFox, has a lush rooftop for tenants’ use. The
feature helped persuade RSM, an accounting firm, to rent space in the building,
said Danny Jackson, a principal at the company.


Image

A rendering of Springdale Green, a project in Austin, Texas, that will feature a
bird blind.Credit...Gensler and dwg

In Austin, Texas, Jay Paul Company’s Springdale Green is “more outside than
inside,” said Philip A. Mahoney, executive vice chairman at Newmark, which is
handling leasing. Developed on a former brownfield site that is being remediated
with native grasses and woodland plants, the project revolves around two office
buildings designed by Gensler that will have 36,000 square feet of terraces. A
boardwalk meandering through the landscape will be outfitted with hammocks and a
feature billed as a bird blind, where office workers can spy purple martins.

“The pandemic amplified everything,” said George Blume, a design director at
Gensler. “Instead of biophilia being a fun little footnote, it became
essential.”

Owners of older buildings have been converting every available outdoor area into
terraces for tenants.

The Durst Organization has been creating them on the setback portions of its
Manhattan high rises, previously cluttered with mechanical equipment and off
limits to tenants. Offices with the terraces command $15 to $25 more per square
foot than offices without them — and they lease faster, said David Neil, a
principal who oversees commercial leasing for the company.


Image

A renovation of the Victor Building in Washington added vegetable beds on the
roof.Credit...Todd Mason

Vegetable gardens are sprouting everywhere. When Brookfield Properties renovated
the Victor Building in Washington, it added vegetable beds on the roof so office
occupants can pluck parsley and basil before heading home to cook dinner. And
Jamestown, another real estate company, hired the firm Copiana to add aeroponic
garden systems — cone-shaped towers with openings through which leafy greens
grow — at properties in Atlanta.



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But it is beekeeping that has really taken off, enabling landlords to provide a
crowd-pleasing amenity and flaunt their environmental credentials. Landlords are
hoping the bees make office buildings attractive in the wake of the pandemic,
and outfits such as Alvéole, which installed Nuveen’s hives, are making it easy
for them to provide the perk.

Alvéole, which is based in Montreal, charges an average of $8,000 annually for
its services and has seen a 666 percent increase in revenue since the start of
the pandemic, said Shelby Schulman, the company’s beekeeping team regional
manager for the United States. Goldman Sachs recently announced that it would
roll out Alvéole hives on its properties nationwide.

Beacon Capital, which has hives on 35 properties, has been working with Best
Bees, a Boston-based company that has also seen its business grow during the
pandemic. Beacon Capital has used some of its honey to make beer, Mr. Scaramelli
said, describing it as “not strong, not weird — a hint of honey but not
overpowering.”

“Tenants love the bees,” he added.









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