For years, we have designed spaces starting from the human perspective, considering posture, needs, emotions. And that is still the case.
But today, a new actor has entered the workplace: artificial intelligence. It does not replace people; it multiplies their interactions and alters their pace. We are no longer alone in the room. There are now two of us: an emotional mind and an algorithmic one, operating according to very different temporal and functional logics. And this, inevitably, has a design impact. So the question becomes: what happens to space when two different intelligences coexist within it?
From the labs of the future to today’s desks
This is a topic also explored by Gensler in its research on “next labs”. From biotech to robotics, laboratories are becoming hybrid environments: automated processes alongside human decision-making, real-time data reshaping workflows, ecosystems of different intelligences sharing the same operational space. What is happening in labs today will happen in offices tomorrow.
This is where the Altis method finds a crucial role: reading the interplay between behaviours, processes and spaces, and translating it into a project that favours neither the machine nor the person, but the relationship between the two.
Designing for a dual intelligence
Here are the new design elements that come into play when creating environments where different speeds can truly coexist:
- Cognitive buffers Spatial interfaces that regulate the flow of information between humans and machines: transition rooms, decision-settling zones, areas where automation can slow down in favour of human judgement.
- Thresholds of attention Paths that separate moments of high computational intensity from moments of high emotional intensity. AI signals, suggests, predicts; humans integrate, evaluate and modulate.
- Asynchronous rhythms Spaces designed for work that no longer follows a single temporal metric: biological time (pause, posture, rest) alongside algorithmic time (continuous calculation). Design must harmonise these cycles, preventing overload.
- Human interfaces Areas where technology does not dominate but converses: screens that inform without overwhelming, predictive systems that do not interrupt, environments where the digital remains legible and governable.
The Altis method as mediator
When processes become hybrid and decisions move across two frequencies, a clear design posture is required. With its three-step Method Consult, Design, Deliver, Altis provides a framework to govern this coexistence. An approach that protects the human dimension by translating complexity into an ecosystem that is coherent, readable and inhabitable. Because as work accelerates into the virtual and AI-driven realm, the collective dimension tends to thin out. Physical space then becomes the necessary counterpoint: the place that reminds us that, in order to function, we still need one another.
If these reflections resonate with your workplace, write to us at [email protected]. Some conversations deserve to take shape.
