Partitioning your office gives you the opportunity to improve your work space in a stylish and cost-effective way. These spaces can be partitioned using either solid or glass partitions, or a combination of the two. You may already have a good feel for which type of partition will be appropriate for your project. The choice between solid and glass is both an aesthetic and a functional one. Each room has its own uses, which will determine the levels of privacy needed. They will also affect the need for quiet, or lack of it. Visibility is another consideration, as is the general atmosphere of the workspace. In general, office spaces which are partitioned, are done so in order to improve working environments for employees, primarily in order to increase productivity and morale. In showrooms and sales environments, they can be used to allow improved visibility of product marketing. Glass partitions give a professional, open and welcoming feel to an office space.
What Difference Will Solid or Glass Partitions Make to My Workspace?
Removing physical barriers is important when trying to create an open and inclusive work space. However, it’s not always practical, comfortable or advisable to have a completely open-plan office. Thankfully, it doesn’t have to be a binary decision. Glass partitions can be used to allow people to see in and out of rooms, giving privacy while still facilitating visual communication. It also has the health benefits of maximizing the amount of natural light that proliferates the space in question – even more so if the natural light enters through a skylight in the central part of the office. Full, solid partitions are useful for spaces which do require full privacy, such as changing rooms, storage rooms, medical bays and so on. There is not a definitive list matching the designated purpose of a room to the type of partition needed, however, it is possible to make an informed decision on what type of partition is preferable. This should be based on the characteristics of each type of partition and how that relates to the space in question.
- Openness and Privacy Combined – Glass partitions are most popular in spaces which need to feel open, yet still need a degree of privacy within each partition. They are often put up to replace solid, drywalls, which create an excellent level of privacy, yet tend to create an atmosphere of division within a workspace. Replacing these with glass helps to foster a sense of togetherness and collaboration that modern organizations need in order to stay relevant these days.
- Flexibility – Glass partitions offer a very large degree of flexibility to the outlay of a business or other organization’s workspace. Fixed walls cannot easily be reconfigured when changes in the organization require it. Modern partitions, however, can do just that, allowing management to customize the available area for optimal performance as needs change.
- Planning – Despite this functional flexibility, glass partitions need to be planned properly for the spaces in which they will be installed. The site needs to be measured first, with special attention paid to the different ranges of height between the floors and ceilings. The type of ceiling existing in the space is important, as this will affect how each glass panel will be connected to it. The same applies to the flooring. Glass interacts differently with carpets, tile, wood and so on. Finally, existing doors may need to be incorporated into the new modular structure, and their configuration will affect the new panels.
- Electrics – Electrical, communications and data cables and their routes around the office need to be assessed in advance. It is usually preferable to have these housed in a solid part of any panelling, as the sight of cables running alongside glass is perhaps as aesthetically repulsive as the sight of loose and messy cables themselves.
- Time – Both glass and solid partitions are designed and configured away from the workspace before they are installed. This has the effect of vastly reducing the amount of physical disruption that an organization suffers when restructuring a work area. Unlike drywalls, they are quick, easy and less disruptive to install. It may well be the case that solid partitions are slightly easier to install than glass ones, due to the different interactions of glass with other surfaces. This difference, however, should be considered to be minimal and of little consequence to scheduling.
- Creative Use – While the primary function of glass is to be transparent (unless it is frosted glass), the main function of a solid wall is the opposite. When it comes to comparing them both with drywalls, they both do favourably. Solid partition walls, of course offer more opportunities for creative and constructive usage – interesting surface coverages, picture frames, projector screens and so on can all be mounted on solid partition panels quite easily.
- Storage – Partition walls can create excellent opportunities for storage spaces that were previously inconceivable with traditional drywalls. You can design and operate spaces specifically tailored to the type of storage space you want to create. Glass and solid partition panels can be used, depending on whether visual outside access is desirable or not. In most cases, perhaps unsurprisingly, solid partition walls are chosen for this purpose. Dedicated storage walls can also be finished with hinged glazed doors, filing frames, pull out drawers, shelves, rails and many other features, according to your need.
Remodelling an office can be complicated enough even when dealing with 100% drywalls. As the option of using solid and glass partitions opens up many more creative design possibilities, it can make it difficult to find the time to sit down and explore all the possibilities before settling on the ideal one for a particular space and function. Rather than potentially waste time considering designs which will ultimately be rejected, due to their unsuitability, our staff can share their expertise with you, in order to help with ideas, or to assist you in visualizing the design which suits your practical organizational needs. Their combined experience in design, aesthetics and ergonomics can help you to ensure that you get the combination of glass, solid and storage panels just right for the needs of your organization.