Simon Carter

Chief executive, British Land

- By Joanna Partridge

As anew development takes shape in the City, the real-estate boss explains how his company bet big on a return to the office after Covid ... and won.

winter garden filled with plants, dedicated areas to suit both extrovert and introvert workers, a “social lobby”, and a cycle ramp into the building: this is the office of the future.

Well, at least a version of it — as envisioned by property developer British Land and to be made reality within a vast new project at 2 Finsbury Avenue, or “2FA”, in the City of London. With the world of work upended by the pandemic, the bells-and-whistles development is designed to offer companies every thing to keep the modern white-collar worker satisfied in the office.

FTSE-listed British Land believes 2FA will provide an “instantly recognisable addition” to the London skyline, with one 36-storey and one 23-storey tower, linked by the winter garden at the top of a 12-storey-high “podium”.

In the post-Covid world of work, large companies on the hunt for high-end workplaces have new demands, including outdoor space, says British Land’s chief executive, Simon Carter.

“It’s about having the right types of space within the building because of the way in which work’s changed” Carter tells the Observer from a room in British Land’s neighbour ing building 3 Broadgate, overlooking the 2FA construction site and Liverpool Street, now the nation’s busiest railway station.

“I's less about rows and rows of desks and functional work, and that’s why our customers are allocating more of their space to break-out areas, community areas, quiet booths for taking phone calls”