Now in its seventeenth year, Interior Design’s Best of Year Awards recognizes the most significant work from designers and architects worldwide. SOM’s New York City studio won the 2022 Best of Year Award in the “Firm’s Own Office: Domestic” Category. Two additional SOM projects were honored: The Trade Desk New York Office, in the “Office Transformation” category, and Chicago’s 800 Fulton Market in the “Large Commercial Lobby and Amenity Space” category.

For our new studio in New York City, we took the opportunity to apply principles of healthy, sustainable, and low-carbon office design to our own workspace. The 80,000 square-foot office spans two interconnected floors in 7 World Trade Center, an SOM-designed building completed in 2006. Through an approach of “radical reduction”— minimizing material use and creating expansive, flexible spaces—the new office demonstrates what a forward-looking workplace can be.

Designed as a “city within a building,” The Trade Desk New York Office spans five floors of the Grace Building. The large open plan is accentuated by a three-story atrium and focal media wall. The design blends The Trade Desk’s laidback California roots with New York City’s urban density, while nodding to the company’s values of collaboration, transparency, and wellness.

800 Fulton Market is a mixed-use office building in a fast-growing and dynamic Chicago neighborhood. Defined by a cantilevered staircase, the nearly 40-foot-tall main lobby is a layered space of activity with flexible workstations and seating.