COEX - Container Exchange
COEX - Container Exchange
A sustainable office design that fosters collaboration, wellbeing, and showcases environmental commitment.
Strategic Workplace Design & Delivery • 1,300sqm
OVERVIEW
COEX had outgrown a multi-level office layout that fragmented their team. The split across floors made collaboration difficult, limited how people could work together, and didn’t reflect an organisation whose mission centres on sustainability and inclusion. PMG was engaged to lead a Workplace Strategy and design response that would bring Container Exchange (COEX) back together on one floor, and to ground that decision in evidence rather than instinct.
DEFINE
Understanding What COEX Needed
Before committing to a new workplace, COEX needed to understand what their people required from one. PMG developed a workplace strategy that mapped how COEX’s teams collaborate, where communication broke down across levels, and what mix of settings would support their range of work styles, analysis that shaped every decision that followed.
That strategy set the brief. The primary goal was to foster connection, collaboration, creativity, and innovation while supporting a range of work styles. COEX prioritised accessibility, wellbeing, and family-friendly spaces, aiming to become an employer of choice. Sustainability was a key focus, with local suppliers required to commit to using recycled materials throughout the design. The layout needed to be practical, functional, future-proof, and flexible enough to adapt spaces such as the town hall area, incorporating meeting rooms, offices, workstations, and robust acoustic treatment throughout.
DESIGN
Layout and Palette
The strategy called for a 1,232sqm single-floor office with a circular floorplan, connecting the space seamlessly and giving every team equal access to amenities and views. A warm and playful palette blends neutral tones with vibrant pops of colour, creating a welcoming atmosphere that embodies the organisation’s inclusive culture.
Family, Wellbeing, and Accessibility
A family area, complete with marine-themed wallpaper, a TV, and beanbags, gives children visiting the office their own space. A parent’s room with a microwave and fridge, and a separate wellbeing room for quiet reflection, prayer, or wellness, respond directly to COEX’s priority of becoming an employer of choice. Accessibility is built throughout the floor, with an accessible sink in the kitchen breakout island, thoughtfully placed room booking panels and intercoms, and hearing loop signage installed in the boardroom and kitchen and breakout areas, backed by an additional portable hearing loop.
Sustainability as a Design Feature
Sustainability is embedded directly into the material palette rather than sitting alongside it as an afterthought. A custom feature ceiling in the arrivals and breakout space uses 100% recycled HDPE panels by Defy Design, while Saveboard Better Joinery panels, crafted from fully upcycled materials, appear throughout the locker designs and storage pelmets. The breakout area features a floating island effect finished in timber-look laminate, vinyl flooring, and textural island tiles. Indigenous designs, using Ontera Water Yuludarla, run through the feature carpets of the front-of-house meeting rooms and the CEO office. Furniture is locally designed and manufactured, including Five Mile Radius’s pink concrete coffee and side tables, and Design By Them’s pots and ottomans made from recycled plastic, with Baux recyclable wood wool acoustic panels installed in the boardroom and meeting rooms.
THE OUTCOME
COEX now operates from a workplace shaped by evidence gathered directly from their people. Sustainability, accessibility, and inclusion are built into the everyday environment, carried through every material choice rather than limited to a set of stated values. The result reflects the kind of grounded, strategy-first workplace design Brisbane organisations can expect when the design brief comes from genuine analysis of how people work.
