Tour of Nerd Wallet

As you guys know, one of my favorite thing is to take tours of new spaces and share some pics.

Sol gave me a quick tour of his new gig, Nerd Wallet. In short, it reminded me of Droxbox, but a little more organized. Nerd Wallet just moved recently, so it’s probably not a fair comparison. ^_^



DSC 3816

Nerd Wallet is located in heart of the Market St. It’s a pretty hot space, with tons of activity, food, and crazy people.



DSC 3819

If you go down a few blocks, you’ll be in the “bad” part of town, so I was warned not to wander around too far.


DSC 3822

So when you first enter the office, you see balloons everywhere, celebrating a big release.



DSC 3844

At first, glance, their office doesn’t look like much until you turn right and everything opens up. This is a photo of Sol offering all their swag, stored behind the reception area.



DSC 3825

For the most part, the office is completely open, with offices in the center, open desks on the outside, and then lounging areas against the windows.



DSC 3827

All desks are fully electronically adjustable desks. The desks themselves are tiny, but Nerd Wallet hooks everyone up with apple cinema displays.



DSC 3831

I’m guessing that less than 20% of their employees actually stand… but it’s a cool bragging right. Which makes me start to ask, “where does all this money come from”. Those desks, monitors and chairs are not cheap! I know, since we tried pricing them out at AddThis at one point.



DSC 3832

For those of you that are curious, here’s Sol’s new desk. How he’s able to fit 2 apple cinema displays and a laptop boggles me. But boy, that’s cool.



DSC 3835

Notice how the desks are on the left, while there’s tons of lounging areas on the outside perimeter, next to the windows. I love the use of funky furniture.



DSC 3836

Here’s a close up of one of the lounging areas. There’s a pretty cool feel to it.



DSC 3837

There is certainly a variety of seating areas. I like it, but at some points, it looks almost like a furniture warehouse. Heheh.



DSC 3838

Seriously, there is a ton of variety. This is definitely a theme.



DSC 3840

The amount of people in the office is mind blowing. I’m sure it gets noisy in there, but they’ve added sound panels to the high ceilings and carpets virtually everywhere.



DSC 3829

Moving towards the center of the office, they have conference rooms of different shapes, sizes and styles. The conference room pictured above, has been commandeered by their design team.

On a side note, it sounds like their design team works somewhat separately from their engineering team. I’d probably recommend that they at least have a design lead working with a team of engineers on major features and initiatives, while a shared design division supports the rest of the org.



DSC 3826

And yes, they have telephone booths as well. Pretty upscale and comfy. Well done.



DSC 3824

And medium sized conference rooms.



DSC 3841

And there’s actually a couple kitchens on this floor.



DSC 3843

And tech vending machines.



DSC 3833

And bottle service.



DSC 3845

But wait, there’s more… Another full floor of Nerd Wallet.



DSC 3846

With nooks and crannies.



DSC 3849

More work stations.



DSC 3851

More seating around the perimeter.



DSC 3852

A full size gym. I mean this is massive.



DSC 3853

And for the grand finale, the café area. Look at all those projections, screens, tables, etc. Food catered all day, every day.



DSC 3855

And a full size bar. I mean, open bar all day. This is bonkers. I mean, this is bad ass. It takes balls to put a full size bar in an office. It’s definitely a bragging right… and I guess that keeps employees happy. This my friend, is called “F-U money”.



DSC 3857

There’s ping pong and foosball too. For the record, I made a bet with Sol… if I won, he would come back to AddThis… and if he won, I would work at Nerd Wallet. And of course I won, so Sol owes me. ^_^



DSC 3858

Anyways, look at that kitchen. This is a whole new level of ganster.



DSC 3859

Bathrooms and showers with fresh towels, resort style.



DSC 3861

Bunk beds, for quick naps.



DSC 3866

Sol, thanks for the tour. Nerd Wallet is a pretty dope place. My mind is blown. What an incredible challenge, in terms of designing a space. I’m digging some of the things they’ve started there—it definitely gives me some ideas.

Lambo Desk

Designed by Polish studio RETRO (as a part of their Unique Racing Desks collection), the desk with its classy replication of a Lamborghini’s front-section epitomizes the very phrase – ‘in your face’.

Hat tip: Foo

Microsoft Office Interior

At Microsoft’s campus in Redmond, Washington, Building 4 houses the company’s office innovation team, a staff of planners tasked with determining how offices will work and what they will look like in the next 15 years.

52

13

20

22

72

82

111

121

131

181

211

I mean wow, this is a really cool space. Well thought out and absolutely stunning. This must have been a really fun project to work on. Check out more work from O+A.