BIDVEST
FINANCIAL SERVICES
INTERIOR ARCHITECT: PARAGON INTERFACE | PHOTOGRAPHY: SARAH DE PINA, CHRIS WESSELS
When Bidvest Financial Services decided to centralise
its Braamfontein head office and satellite operations
in the iconic Bidvest Bank Towers at 1 Park Lane in
Sandton, it turned to interior architecture firm Paragon Interface
to design, space-plan and oversee the fit-out. The Paragon Group
was also responsible for the base-build architecture.
Located within the new Katherine Street mixed-use precinct,
1 Park Lane, which has a Gross Lettable Area (GLA) of 21,000m 2 ,
is a P-grade development within walking distance of Sandton City
and the Sandton Gautrain Station.
It offers seven levels of parking and a ground floor, with Bidvest
Financial Services occupying the building from reception to L4.
The decision to move into a new premises was predicated on
having all Bidvest Financial Services companies in one space
in the financial heart of Sandton, explains Paragon Interface
associate Kirsty Schoombie. “The brief was to create an efficient
open-plan environment that connected all of these business units
together. The office interior was designed to promote collaboration
between the different businesses,” Schoombie explains. This is
also in line with the latest trend for agile or shared workspaces.
The building itself consists of two towers, with the four Bidvest
floors linked by an internal atrium and bridges. A total of 705
employees occupy the Bidvest office space, which has a GLA
of 11,275m 2 . There are seven ‘smart’ lifts, two of which are
dedicated shuttle lifts from the parking levels to the reception
floor atrium.
Paragon Interface strived to extend the Bidvest Financial
Services corporate identity throughout the four floors by focusing
on a corporate colour for each floor, drawn from the entity’s
secondary colour palette of teal, yellow and oranges.
58 Bidvest