Partner Richard Wetzel said the construction company’s new 10,000-square-foot office “kept the exact same feel and culture of that table.”
The office, on the first floor of the former McQueeny Lock Building in the Crossroads Arts District, is designed to be open and transparent. Keeping with the company’s history, the office has tables rather than desks. Wetzel and partner Steve Swanson each sit in the middle of the office with a long conference table between them.
“As we’ve been growing our company, it’s been important to us to help to teach and train those that are coming up in the business about how we make decisions and how we do what we do,” Wetzel said. “We feel like having an open office allows others to hear the discussions and decisions and sometimes arguments.”
Employees also can work from a rooftop lounge and conference room, shared with two other companies in the building, and an open courtyard by the entrance.
In addition to the open floor plan and outdoor spaces, the office is filled with work from artists who have displayed pieces in Centric’s offices in the past.
Wetzel said previous partnerships with these artists began out of necessity. But they reflect the company’s ties to the Crossroads, where all three iterations of its offices have been.
These aspects of the office, he said, show where the company has been as well as where it is going.
“A lot of people would say they have the coolest office space because of pingpong tables,” Wetzel said. “For us, it’s more about being really authentic to who we are.”