Reece – The Works
Reece is a leading supplier to building trades and an iconic Australian company. Reece engaged Sandpit to design creative installations for its new company headquarters in Melbourne.
Reece wanted to enhance the daily workplace experience for their staff and visitors, with engaging and interactive installations that complement the Reece brand and celebrate the organisation’s history and people.
We wanted our design for the Reece building to reflect the Reece aesthetic and identity. We incorporated shapes and materials that are key to the Reece world – pipes, faucets, copper, stainless steel – into many aspects of our experience design.
Water Well
Water Wells are small piping installations connected to water fountains around the Reece building. The piping varies from brass and copper to stainless steel.
Each station has a screen and a shelf fitted with an NFC (Near Field Communication) reader. Users are greeted personally when they place their water bottles on the shelves and the screen shows the amount of water flowing into the bottle. A Reece Waterbot is also connected to Facebook Workplace, enabling Reece staff to track their water consumption and set hydration goals.
100 Years of Innovation
We designed oval copper display cases, placed in key locations around the building. These displays showcase items that celebrate Reece’s first 100 years of innovation and imagine the next 100 years to come.
The cases display an eclectic mix of physical objects, 3D models and 2D screen-based content – from a miniature Reece branded truck to a model of a classic 1980s bathroom – with real faucet handles enabling the user to interact with the content.
News Streams
News Streams are high-res LED strip screens, located at strategic points throughout the Reece building – mounted on walls and pipe work and embedded on kitchenette bench tops. They stream headlines from various news channels and invite users to tap through to more detailed content on their own devices. Staff can tap the News Stream screen with their phones and they’ll be sent a link to read later, with NFC (Near Field Communication) technology.
Yarra Mural
Bringing together Cremorne’s street art culture and proximity to the Yarra River with Reece’s tech first focus, Sandpit designed an interactive mural that’s embedded with NFC technology and explores the history of the Yarra River. The mural was delivered in partnership with The Torch; an organisation that supports First Nations artists who have experienced incarceration. It now lives on the exterior wall of Reece’s new home.
The Airlock
Reece wanted an experience at the entry point of the new building that would set the tone for the rest of the users experience. Sandpit created and delivered an immersive experience that brings together sound design and architecture, washing the user in the natural and calming sounds of water as they walk through the airlock of the building. The Airlock gives visitors and Reece’s people alike a brief moment to recalibrate, and sets their time at Reece apart from the outside world.
Flow Wall
Sandpit designed the Flow Wall for Reece as a highly agile and multipurpose screen wall that would be simple to manage and non-dominant within the space. The Flow Wall can be used for all sorts of functions, everything from simple presentations to a ‘building takeover’, where every screen surface in the building is programmed to host matching content as a way to celebrate company achievements or mark major holidays.
