2U Headquarters
Lanham, MD
2U, Inc. partners with great universities to bring their degree programs and credit-bearing courses online. Their philosophy is No Back Row: the idea that every person counts; each person is included; and when we each lean in and do our part, we are better individually and collectively. 2U needed a new space that was functional and represented their culture. The team had to convert a multi-tenant, generic office building into a single-user headquarters that is the opposite of generic— expressive of its occupant’s culture, brand, and collegiality of the staff. Their ethos of equality and opportunity is reflected in their workspace with 100% open-plan seating. With no offices, not even for the CEO, many spaces empower employees with choice of workstyle. A smart space plan — one that is not based on hierarchy — became a major tool for driving a functional design with opportunities to meet, focus, and socialize throughout the seven floors.