A new look for Nike’s London headquarters

Rosie Lee brought in illustrators Rob Flowers and Chris Martin to create murals for the space.

The consultancy has previously worked on Nike projects including the design of an interactive installation at Nike Town in Oxford Street to launch the England football kit.  Work began on the office redesign in November last year.

James Nelson, Rosie Lee designer, says, ‘They’d been in the space a little while, and we wanted to make it less monotonous and less like a standard office space.

‘Nike’s got such an interesting visual history, so there’s so much opportunity to take it from being white, grey and dark blue to make it more exciting.’

He adds, ‘The main objective was so that when employees walk in they feel proud and excited to work there, and inspired as well’.

The new look sees the offices, which span three floors, divided into themed ‘zones’, inspired by Nike products, such as Mercurial, Air Jordan and Air Max 180.

Each zone uses a distinct colour scheme and imagery, alongside ‘inspirational copy’, says Rosie Lee.

The new reception area features an illustrated wall mural by Chris Martin in Nike’s orange brand colour, showing imagery of London, Nike products and sports.

Rob Flowers’ illustration is shown at the entrance to the third floor, drawing on similar themes but featuring less obviously London imagery such as pigeons and urban foxes.

Rosie Lee also created the  ‘Nike Tech zone’, illustrated with a wall drawing of the new Nike FuelBand, with the band’s interface inspiring dot and number treatments across the matt black wall.

A social space dubbed the ‘Designed To Move’ area features a pine wood ‘Waffle Wall’, which Rosie Lee says ‘references the pivotal moment when Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman began experimenting with rubber soles by pouring liquid rubber compound into his wife’s waffle iron to create a sole that forever changed the design of running shoes’.

Features used throughout include reclaimed basketball court wood, laser-sintered 3D models, wall and window vinyls and hand-painted typography and table legs formed from scaffolding