Material Echoes : Tactile Poetry in the Forum’s Palette
Materiality as Emotional Architecture
Materials are not simply finishes; they hold memory, temperature and emotion. They shape how a space feels long before we understand how it functions. In Forum, materiality forms the emotional core of the interior, grounding the workspace in warmth, tactility and a quiet sense of gravitas. The palette guides movement, anchors the body, softens the senses and creates an inner climate that feels calm yet alive.
The Material Strategy: Restraint, Rhythm & Spatial Clarity
Forum’s palette is intentionally restrained, consisting of travertine, timber, cork, stone, terracotta, linen and carefully scaled tilework. These materials are arranged in conversation rather than contrast, creating a spatial rhythm that feels legible, humane and deeply textural. Transitions are expressed through tonal shifts and tactile edges, allowing users to sense where they are and where they are moving without relying on signage. In Forum, material becomes orientation, atmosphere and mood.
Travertine & Stone: Weight, Grounding & a Sense of Ceremony
Travertine is one of Forum’s defining gestures. It wraps clustered structural columns, anchors vertical surfaces and articulates key junctions with quiet confidence. Its porous, matte surface softens daylight into a gentle glow, grounding the interior with stability and calm. Warm greys, muted creams and natural veining create a neutral gravity that allows softer materials to resonate. Large-format stone surfaces lend monumentality, while finer detailing brings delicacy, together forming the architectural backbone of the workspace.
Timber, Cork & Warm Layering: Softness, Approachability, Human Scale
Where stone brings permanence, timber introduces empathy. It appears in joinery, shelving, desk surrounds and transitional planes, bringing the body back to human scale. Cork, used prominently in the arrival sequence and stepped seating landscape, adds an unexpected tactile softness underfoot. Its acoustic performance helps quieten social areas, creating a gentler soundscape. Together, timber and cork form the palette’s emotional warmth: approachable, embodied and instinctively familiar.
Tiles, Terracotta & Ceramic Accents: Craft, Warmth & Human Touch
In communal and social zones, terracotta tiles and custom ceramic lighting introduce a crafted, human layer. Their matte clay tones extend warmth through both colour and texture. Tile module, grout spacing and surface texture subtly reinforce spatial rhythm, marking natural pauses for gathering, transition or rest. These crafted elements prevent the interior from feeling overly polished; instead, they lend character, imperfection and invitation, making the workplace feel lived in and loved.
Light & Material Dialogue: Space That Changes With the Day
Daylight interacts with materials in shifting tones, creating a living palette that evolves over the course of the day. Travertine absorbs and releases a soft glow; timber deepens in warmth as the afternoon light settles; cork mutes reflections, reducing overstimulation; ceramic surfaces catch highlights and animate quieter corners. Vaulted and curved geometries help diffuse light further.
The result is a workspace that breathes, warming in the morning, mellowing at midday and resting into calmer shadows by late afternoon. This dynamic creates an atmosphere of calm stimulation, a sense of time passing gently and an interior that feels alive.
“Nothing is overly saturated,
nothing competes for attention,
colour here supports presence,
allowing the mind to settle and the body to relax into its surroundings.”
A Sensory Counterbalance to Digital Life
Natural materials, breathable finishes, low-VOC products and layered acoustics form a quiet shield against digital oversaturation. In Forum, materiality is restorative. It supports calmer nervous systems, slower breathing, deeper concentration and a sense of belonging. The workplace becomes a sensory refuge where people can return to themselves.
Material as the Soul of Space
Forum’s restrained palette reveals how depth can be achieved through texture rather than colour complexity, The interplay between light and material behaves as a living system, shifting throughout the day and infusing the space with a quiet sense of vitality. In the context of the contemporary workplace, this sensitivity ensures durability is balanced with emotional resonance, creating an environment that is both robust and deeply felt.
"Our default is to specify honest, healthy materials to ensure the well-being of the space's inhabitants and the planet," founder of foolscap, Adèle Winteridge says.
Forum ultimately demonstrates how profoundly materiality shapes the emotional quality of a workspace. Travertine brings gravity, timber brings warmth, cork brings softness and terracotta brings craft, while light binds everything together into a dynamic, evolving palette. It is a space that is not only functional but felt, grounded, generous and profoundly human.
Photography: Martina Gemmola
