The new Vectra Bank Corporate Center in Denver employs a modern approach to office space with welcomed in natural light, local art and standing desks.

It’s what developers call the future of office space that embraces technology, while providing enough amenities to make workers want to come back to the office after years of remote working.

Denver-based Confluent Development completed the Vectra Bank Corporate Center, a division of Zions Bancorporation, N.A., at 7222 East Layton Ave., in December.

Vectra officials envisioned the new center as early as 2018, but work truly began with the groundbreaking in November 2020.

Partnerships were made with Open Studio Architecture, Weitz Co. and Provident Construction to bring the building to fruition.

Employees started working in the office — which was designed with the pandemic-influenced “new way of working” in mind — Jan. 9. In March, there will be a grand opening for employees, stakeholders and media.

The building has 127,000 of rentable square footage in the nine-story building at Belleview Station — a mixed-use community that offers dining, shopping, office space and living space developed by Front Range Land and Development.

The building is composed of cast-in-place, slab-on-grade structure from the ground floor to level five with a steel-framed structure rising to nine stories, according to a news release from Confluent. It is designed to LEED Silver standards and has a hospital-grade air filtration system.

The opening of this new office will bring back more than 200 employees from across the metro area, many of whom have been working remotely, into one space. The new location benefits commuters as it meets at the convergence of I-25 and I-225, while also being near the Belleview Light Rail Station, according to company officials.

Employees can see the station from windows throughout the building. There are four floors of office space and parking. Amenities include views of mountains and downtown, eight electric vehicle charging stations, bicycle storage, a conference center, an open-air patio on the sixth floor, a café, a fireplace and a lobby on the ninth floor.

Unlike traditional office buildings, cubicles are stationed near the external sides of the office allowing for easy access to windows for daylight. Offices are lined on the inside of the building, but each desk set up from cubicle to a one room office has the same amenities.

There are several rooms set up with three options: Technology as the center point; technology that can be utilized through plug-in options, or no technology at all. These spaces without technology offer opportunities for employees to sit and talk or have lunch with one another semi-privately (closed doors with glass walls), which was thought of as a way to bring the social aspects back to the office setting.

Bruce Alexander, president and CEO of Vectra, said the architects and design team did a good job designing this building for the long run.

“We just were really excited about the location and to be kind of on the early edge, the cutting edge of it we could really make a statement in the way we could design the building,” Alexander said.

Sound masking has been implemented throughout the office space, which offers control on how quiet a room can become including in the conference rooms.

Local art from across the state adorn the walls throughout, from offices to kitchen and lobby spaces. Even the cubicles picked out were chosen with employees in mind, offering sit-standing desks, organization for office items and a closet-like compartment for jackets and other necessities. Coffee stations are located throughout, while beer taps and a self-pay snack station available in the kitchen area — which can double as an event space.

“Recruiting and retaining employees is a big challenge for everybody these days,” Alexander said. “And part of the reason we designed the building the way we did with all the amenities we did was we really wanted people to want to come back to work.”

Celeste Tanner, president and chief development officer at Confluent Development, said that office spaces across the metro and throughout the country’s major cities have outdated designs and were created prior to modern technology, such as a computer being an essential part of desk space.

“The majority of the existing office [space] that is in place today was built before people used computers at their desk,” Tanner said. “When you want to build for a generational space … you really do need to plan that building for the future. I think to be able to have that flexibility and have that communicate out to the associates that are here, that shows a longevity and a commitment that you just don’t get in a lease space.”

For more information, visit www.vectrabank.com.