Telia goes in for 80 per cent reused interior furnishings
When just over 700 employees move into Telia’s new premises in Luleå, re-use and sustainability will be the central focus. Around 80 per cent of the interiors consist of reused furniture. “We felt a strong need to make use of used furniture in a sustainable way,” says Tommy Nordström, from Group Real Estate at Telia Company.
Telia’s employees will move into their new premises in Luleå this week. The work of filling the 7,200 m2 office space with furniture and furnishings has been under way for several weeks. Of the interiors now in place in Luleå, just over 80 per cent are made up of reused furnishings.
“When we relocated the operation in Stockholm from Farsta to Solna, there was a lot of furniture left. We felt a strong need to make use of this in a sustainable way and that was when the idea of re-use developed. The project has progressed smoothly and we have had excellent support and commitment from our employees right from the start, which is a great feeling,” says Tommy Nordström.
Furniture with new functions
The furniture that has been reused as part of the project is durable and of a high quality, ensuring that the refurbishment and renovation it has undergone will extend its useful life and stand up to new needs. Some furniture has simply been spruced up with new fabrics or surfaces, while other items have undergone a total makeover, been completely reconditioned, and been given new functions and a new lease of life.
Increased interest in re-use
The re-use project in Luleå is unique in Sweden in terms of size. And interest in making use of existing furniture and furnishings instead of scrapping them and buying new ones has increased. That’s the opinion of Mille Milehem, COO at Input interior, which handled project management of the re-use process and delivered the reconditioned furnishings to Telia’s office.
“We are seeing growing interest in this type of re-use of furniture. It’s partly a matter of increased awareness among employees and the public. We expect companies to think about their surroundings and the environment. Utilisation of the earth’s limited resources must be part of a circular cycle – not a ticket to the rubbish dump,” says Mille, and continues:
“When it involves such large quantities of interior furnishings, it makes a real difference. If we just consider the 700 or so desks and 550 office chairs that have been given a new lease of life in this project alone, they contain 30 tons of metal, 16 tons of wood and three tons of plastic. And that’s just a small percentage of all the furniture in this project,” concludes Mille Milehem.
