New digital issue of Works magazine is available for you to read online. If you don’t get the print edition, you’re missing out

The new issue of Works magazine is now available for you to read online free. 2026 promises to be yet another revolutionary year for work and workplaces and we’ll be with you at every step along the way. In this issue: you’ll find three case studies and a round up of projects highlighting new thinking and best practice in workplace design; we consider how Canary Wharf and other business districts are in rude health in spite of the obituaries we may have read about them in recent years; there’s commentary from Adam Scott, Su Lim and Stephanie Fitzgerald; we have reports from two round tables in London as well as a look back on Design Mumbai; the latest news on products, materials and events. Plus there are loads more features, including our podcast series with Shaw Contract exploring the different facets of comfort.

CONTENTS

VIEWFINDER
A new exhibition in London celebrates the enduring value of architectural drawing around the world

COMMENTS
Two vexed topics in this issue. Adam Scott and Su Lim consider the real pull factors that will get people into an office while Stephanie Fitzgerald shares her thoughts on the already apparent horrors of AI and its effect on our lives

SHOWROOM
A round up of latest business news and some of the best new products and services on the market from major suppliers

CASE STUDY: LIFE AND MIND BUILDING
Jo Knight visits the new Life and Mind Building at Oxford to see how the world’s oldest university is addressing a series of very modern challenges including sustainable building design, offering people choice about where, when and how to work, and how to create something that is fit for both now and the future

THE NEW FACE OF INNOVATION
A new generation of workplace professionals is now reshaping and rethinking what we expect and need from offices. We gathered a multi-generational panel of experts to discuss what this means in practice and how we should all look to adapt to a new, groundbreaking approach to the working environment

CASE STUDY: TALON
The new headquarters of a creative media agency show how an office can redefine our relationship with work and the city

CANARY WHARF
Reports of the death of Canary Wharf and by extension other business districts around the world have been very much exaggerated as new deals and new office for major occupiers demonstrate

CASE STUDY: CASA ITALIA
Bringing together the Italian Embassy, Cultural Institute and Trade Agency, Casa Itala is a lively space for diplomacy, culture and commerce at the heart of London

DESIGN MUMBAI
The themes, products and content programme of Design Mumbai now mark it out as one of the most important and forward thinking shows on the international office design exhibition circuit. Joanna Knight reports on an event that goes from strength to strength

ROUND TABLE
The long and increasingly tiresome conversation about whether people should spend more time in the office needs to move on. It should now focus on how to deliver what people want. A recent event in London got the ball rolling with workplace expert Jim Taylour leading the conversation with an invited panel and audience of guests

PROJECTS
When people can work anywhere, how do you make the office one of the best choices they can make? Here’s a roundup of some outstanding and inspiring workplaces from around the world that provide an answer to the greatest question of our time

MATERIALS FOCUS
Innovation comes in many forms… and increasingly in many materials. Here’s our regular round up of the latest news, ideas and products including a look at how much office furniture goes to landfill, a new material made from fish scales, a reinvention of a traditional Norwegian fabric and a look ahead to Material matters in Copenhagen

EVENTS
Who doesn’t like a get together? It’s now more important than ever to bring people together in common causes or just to meet with old and new friends and enjoy themselves

FLOORING MATTERS
Our podcast series in partnership with Shaw Contract explores the various aspects of comfort through conversations with a world renowned panel of experts

WORKPLACE TRENDS
Which is memory-holed first? New Year’s resolutions? Or the trends and predictions lists that gum up the media at the beginning and end of each year?

WELCOME

The Word of the Year for 2025 was slop, according to the Economist. Similarly, brain rot was the phrase of the year 2024 according to the Oxford University Press and others.
This tells us a lot about where we are in terms of the information and entertainments we consume. Like many people, I spend too much time online and occasionally find myself dragged into the recesses of the Internet where this stuff exists. It is designed by clever and aware people to drag us in.

In short time, GenAI has flooded the online realm with slop and is now consuming it and shitting it back out like a digital centipede.

To exacerbate this, we have already replaced our editors and curators with algorithms. We base our belief in information on our own prejudices and what we perceive as worthwhile on what we see online.

The creation and ingestion of slop can override our ability to see the world for what it is. Instead, it presents us with an image of the world as it is imagined and processed. This is not about understanding anything. It is about satisfying an instinct, and often a base instinct.

There are limits to what we can understand. I can only talk about a handful of subjects with any degree of confidence and one way I know this is by trying to express my understanding of something outside of that small realm of expertise.

I may grasp an idea when it is explained to me, but when I try to express it, my lack of insight becomes clear. Writing is not only thinking, it is also humbling. We should be able to spot the canny valley as well as the uncanny valley. We should know our limitations.

This matters because what we make also makes us.

mje