Effective Ideas for Designing an Aesthetic and Functional Conference Room

The Conference room is a central place in an office where productive discussions, brainstorming and training sessions, important business deals and decisions take place. It is a place where employees come for important meetings with the aim of enhancing the business and achieving the key business objectives. It is the same room where external business clients or any third-party visitors are welcomed to exchange ideas or build partnerships. With these meeting areas playing such a pivotal role, it is necessary to hire a professional interior design consultancy to design a conference room that sets the right atmosphere.

Some of the essential elements to be considered while designing a conference room include:

1. Layout Design:

These rooms can be designed using different types of layouts including a banquet-style layout, theatre-style layout, classroom-style layout, u-shaped style layout, boardroom-style layout and a hollow rectangle or square layout. The banquet-style layout involves seating arrangement around an oval or hexagonal table. It is best suited for businesses that use this area for training sessions. The theatre-style layout is ideal for companies that use an audience-speaker mode of communication. It is preferable for companies that host many presentations, seminars and workshops and have large employee strength. As evident by its name, classroom-type layout involves a row-type seating arrangement. The u-shaped layout has a u-shaped conference table with chairs around it allowing seating around the three sides. The boardroom and hollow rectangle-style layout are very popular for small committee or board of director meetings, and discussions. The layout should be selected as per the company’s requirement and type of meetings that the conference room would host.

2. Colour:

Colour has the power to elicit response, evoke mood as well as enhance the appearance of the room. The colour chosen should be aesthetically appealing whilst creating an atmosphere that suits the objective of the meetings. Furthermore, it should complement the office furniture and decorations. Avoid colour that makes the conference space look congested. The shortlisted colour should be tested under proper lighting conditions to understand the mood it would create.

3. Furniture:

The conference room furniture including the table and chairs should be chosen considering the space available. The furniture should be durable and of good quality. Ergonomic chairs or leather chairs must be preferred as they are comfortable and would boost concentration that is required while taking important decisions in the meeting.

4. Equipment:

A conference room needs to be functional besides being aesthetic. It should possess the necessary accessories and equipment that are vital for a meeting. A conference room should have a projector, an LCD, a speaker, phone lines and Wi-Fi connection, all of which are essential for presentations and meetings to take place.

Sachin Boradia is the Managing Director at Transcend Design Consultants, a leading interior design consultancy providing Interior Design Services to customers in India.