Where does the old panel go?

The invitation to a lobby design review usually comes with a rendering. For one meeting, ask the team to bring a cardboard box too. Make it the size of the part someone will eventually have to remove from the wall. A box will tell you something the rendering can’t. It has to go somewhere.

Imagine a display set flush into a paneled wall beside reception. One afternoon, a technician arrives with the replacement part. They need somewhere to put it while they open the wall. The nearest clear surface is the reception desk. Two visitors are signing in there. Already, a routine piece of maintenance has become a question about how the lobby works.

Draw the room during the repair

In Washington, D.C., NEXT/NOW worked with OTJ Architects on a 52-foot digital wall that curves along an office hallway. Our team met with OTJ and its partners early to check the dimensions, placement, surrounding construction, power and data. The shape of the finished wall depended on people making those decisions together while the office was still on the drawing board. See the OTJ Architects project.

For your own review, take the lobby plan and add the things that will appear during a service call. Mark the open panel, the technician’s position, the replacement part and the piece that just came out. Then ask the person who runs reception to trace a guest’s route from the door to the sign-in desk. If that line crosses the work area, you’ve found a decision the whole team can see.

There may be a good place to stage parts down the hall. A side entrance might work for deliveries. The cleanest answer may be to service the display before reception opens. Each choice belongs to a different person. Capture the one that fits the building, along with the name of the person who can actually arrange it.

Leave the next person a photograph

Once the installation is complete, photograph the access point from far enough back to include a fixed landmark. A close-up of a hidden latch can be beautifully sharp and still leave a technician searching fifty feet of identical panels. On a copy of the photograph, circle the panel and mark where the person opening it stands.

Give that image and the service drawing to someone who missed the project meetings. Walk with them while they find the panel. If they stop at reception to ask directions, listen to the words the receptionist uses. Those may be the clearest instructions you’ll ever put on the drawing.