Office Remodeling

Where the current office stops working

Established firms usually remodel because the office no longer matches how they work. They hired and the open area is packed. They went partly remote and half the private offices sit empty. The conference room is too small for the meetings they actually hold, or too exposed for the conversations that happen in it. Before anyone draws a line, we sit down with the managing partner or office manager and talk about how the staff work now and how they expect to work a few years out.

Then we walk the space with the floor plan in hand. We note which walls are structural or carry building systems, where the electrical and data panels are, how air reaches each room, and where the restrooms and plumbing sit. Those set the cost of each idea. A new wall in an open area is simple. Moving a kitchenette to the other side of the building is a different conversation, and you hear that before the design gets attached to it.

From there you get a written scope that names each room and what happens to it, the order of the phases and what the firm needs to handle on its side, such as clearing files or moving a server. It also lists anything we found that could change the plan, so nothing comes as a surprise later.

Sound, light and the details staff notice

In an office, people notice things that never show up on a drawing. A private office where you can hear every word from the next room has failed, however good it looks. Walls around offices and conference rooms often need insulation inside, should run up to the structure above instead of stopping at the ceiling tiles, and need doors with seals. We go through which rooms need privacy and build those walls to suit.

Light is the other one. Moving walls can cut interior rooms off from the windows, so we look at glass partitions, transoms and where the new lighting goes. Licensed electricians handle the power and lighting rough-in under their own permits, and we coordinate them so outlets land where the desks will actually be.

Break rooms and kitchenettes bring plumbing, and often a separate circuit for each appliance. Cabinets and counters there take more abuse than a home kitchen, so we choose hard-wearing materials with the owner instead of whatever looks good in a sample.

Heating and cooling deserve the same attention. A new private office carved out of an open area may need its own supply and return, or it will run hot all summer. The mechanical contractor checks the system against the new layout, and we plan the ceiling work around their changes.

A private office where you can hear every word from the next room has failed, however good it looks.

Phasing the work around the staff

Few firms can send everyone home for the length of a remodel. So the job is broken into phases. One section of the office is closed and sealed off behind a temporary dust wall while staff work in the rest, and people move as each section is finished. We agree on the phases with the office manager in writing, including where people sit during each one.

Noise is the biggest complaint in an occupied office, so the loud work, demolition, cutting and drilling into concrete, gets scheduled before or after hours, or on Saturdays if the firm prefers. Quieter work can happen during the day. Every evening the work area is cleaned, and the shared hallways and restrooms stay usable.

Moving furniture and computers is usually the firm's job or its vendors', and we schedule around it so desks move at the end of a phase and not into the middle of drywall sanding.

Security matters in an office full of client files. Work areas are separated from occupied ones, doors to sensitive rooms stay locked, and our crew works in the areas agreed on and nowhere else. If the firm wants one of its own people present after hours, we schedule around them.

Older office buildings and what they hide

Plenty of offices around here sit in converted mill buildings, old banks or houses turned into professional offices along a main street. Those buildings come with plaster, uneven floors, old wiring and sometimes lead paint on trim and windows, which calls for lead-safe work practices once it is disturbed. A suspended ceiling may hide an older ceiling a foot above it, with wiring nobody has looked at in decades.

We open up enough during planning to see what is there, and we tell the owner before the proposal is final what the building is likely to throw at us. If something still turns up once the walls are open, you hear about it with photos and options before any extra work is done.

Permits, inspections and keeping you informed

Office remodels that move walls or change systems are permitted work. Many need drawings from a registered architect or engineer, and the new layout has to meet 780 CMR and the accessibility rules in 521 CMR and the ADA, which can affect door widths, hardware and the routes through the office. Inspections follow for framing, the licensed trades and any sprinkler changes, then a final.

Keeping customers informed is the standard Steve built this company on, and an office remodel tests it, because the staff are living with the work every day. You get one contact, regular updates on what was done and what comes next, and notice before any shutdown of power, water or the network that would affect the staff. Every change is described with its effect on price and schedule and approved in writing before it happens.

When the last phase is done, we walk every room with the office manager, make a punch list together and finish it before calling the job complete. The building department's final sign-off and the permit paperwork go into the firm's file.

If your business is moving into empty space and has no office there yet, our office build-out page covers that work. Modern Remodeling remodels offices within about a hundred miles of Raynham. Call (781) 974-4263 to have Steve walk your office.

See the rest of our commercial work, or browse the gallery for rooms we have finished.