Image perfect: offices for a thriving American copy center were inspired by the firm's history and tradition, and by the nature of the business.ImageNet in America is a chain of copy centres that has expanded from a typewriter-repair shop, with one man working on a kitchen table, to a national organization with 350 employees and eight regional offices. In designing the firm's new offices in Oklahoma City Oklahoma City (1990 pop. 444,719), state capital, and seat of Oklahoma co., central Okla., on the North Canadian River; inc. 1890. The state's largest city, it is an important livestock market, a wholesale, distribution, industrial, and financial center, and a farm , Rand Elliott of Elliott+Associates has used ordinary materials and inexpensive construction to encapsulate en·cap·su·late v. 1. To form a capsule or sheath around. 2. To become encapsulated. en·cap the firm's history, and to express the fact that ImageNet is at the cutting edge of the copying/imaging business. The office represents a significant move from an old garage to the third floor of a restored 1920s building in Automobile Alley Automobile Alley is an urban neighborhood in Oklahoma City, located roughly along North Broadway Avenue in Downtown Oklahoma City. The district contains numerous low and midrise heritage buildings and shops. It is listed in the National Historic Register of neighborhoods. , at the heart of the city's new business and technology district. Expression of the firm's history is contrived through design of the lobby. Walls have been given a textural lining of copy paper made into uneven bricks; and the same paper has been used to form three plinths. On top of each one is a rare antique typewriter. Light playing over the pale paper planes illuminates their soft irregular texture and lends them an abstract sculptural quality. From this padded cell you pass into the workspace which, in contrast, is crisply designed with white walls and floor, glazed divisions, overhead ducting duct·ing n. 1. A duct or system of ducts. 2. Material for making ducts. and a glass conference room at the centre. The various sections -- copy room, scanning and imaging -- are repositories of high technology. With the manager's office and data department tucked away from public view to the north of the site, the sections are organized so that customers can wander around and inspect the production and assembly process. The tour is enlivened en·liv·en tr.v. en·liv·ened, en·liv·en·ing, en·liv·ens To make lively or spirited; animate. en·liv  en·er n. by an installation running down the middle of the room. Conceived as a play on the business, the work consists of a series of acrylic sheets suspended between mirrored walls and inscribed in·scribe tr.v. in·scribed, in·scrib·ing, in·scribes 1. a. To write, print, carve, or engrave (words or letters) on or in a surface. b. To mark or engrave (a surface) with words or letters. with fragments of copying history and the story of ImageNet. Words and letters, superimposed su·per·im·pose tr.v. su·per·im·posed, su·per·im·pos·ing, su·per·im·pos·es 1. To lay or place (something) on or over something else. 2. and multiplied, are reflected to infinity and, in passing between the sheets, the viewer becomes part of the copying process. At night, blue fluorescent light suffuses both ImageNet and the adjacent Vesper building, where Elliott is creating premises for a sister company engaged in recycling copier-ink cartridges. RELATED ARTICLE: Architect Elliott+Associates Architects Project team Rand Elliott, Brian Fitzsimmons, Amberly Russell Photographs Hedrich Blessing Our History BMI BMI body mass index. BMI abbr. body mass index Body mass index (BMI) A measurement that has replaced weight as the preferred determinant of obesity. Systems was incorporated in 1977, and the business originated in 1956 as a small, one man typewriter repair shop called Southwest Typewriter Company. Bobby Roberson started this company from his garage in South Oklahoma City. Today BMI Systems and its affiliates, employ over 400 people in eleven cities and five states. |
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