What does it mean to come back to the office when you can work well and be more comfortable at home? Forerunner Ventures is a women-owned boutique VC firm that needed a refined post-pandemic office that would promote their employees to return from home, encourage human interaction and connection, and suit a range of uses for its sophisticated clientele. To form these naturally adaptable spaces, designers fashioned integrated lighting details that yield comfortable, airy spaces united with a curated palette of decorative and integrated task lighting.

LEED accreditation wasn’t required for the project due to its setting in the federally owned Presidio of San Francisco, but designers achieved LEED Gold to uphold sustainability best practices. To lower the energy footprint and support the office’s multifaceted uses, the controls system provides customized programming tailored to users’ partial work from home schedules, and supports individual user control of task and floor lamps while retaining building-wide control overrides.

Designers developed painstakingly integrated details to light the office without using any “traditional” linear office lighting. Uplighting detailed into each space creates an airy, open feel throughout while satisfying general illumination criteria. In open offices, indirect uplight blankets the rooms in crisp, comfortable light, supplemented by task lighting integrated in desks. Conference rooms employ a consistent layered approach with glowing perimeter coves, artful pendants, and minimal downlights. Mud-in linear channels detailed in the skylight transform it into a large-scale glowing overhead “fixture”, establishing visual height with no upward spill light as mandated by locale. At the reception room, small trimless downlights center in ceiling coffers and a veil of light is concealed at the perimeter of built-in shelving, conveying a sense of approachable welcome to visitors. Forerunner Ventures is an archetypal study in the beauty of refinement and seamless cohesion in support of ultimate flexibility.