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An award-winning full-service architecture, interior design, and landscape architecture firm

Kerry Haber is the president of Bernardon. Bernardon provides architecture, interior design, and landscape architecture services with offices in West Chester, PA; Philadelphia, PA; and Wilmington, DE. The firm has worked on numerous multimillion-dollar projects in markets such as housing, retail, higher education, corporate warehousing, hospitality, and civics and cultural centers. Recognized for its sustainable practices, commitment to quality, and prodigious growth rate, Bernardon has won honors and awards from numerous trade groups, industry publications, and regional programs.

EDWIN WARFIELD: How has the corporate architectural market changed since the early days of the firm?

KERRY HABER: The corporate world is definitely changing. Sometimes it’s a pendulum; sometimes it just moves forward. But the main difference between the projects that I did early in my career was the movement away from private offices toward open and collaborative spaces. Hewlett Packard was one of the first companies that made a decision to have no private offices. That is still uncommon. But the number of private offices has changed, and the collaborative work environment has become the primary vision of most companies.

Some of that is driven by generational issues. We all hear about millennials—that they want to have an informal atmosphere that is very cooperative and collaborative—and so what we try and do with our corporate work is provide a mix of different types of spaces. You need private spaces. You need small gathering places for team meetings. You need conference rooms for large conferences. Every client that we go in to—they never have enough conference rooms, ever, no matter how many you build in. And then the workstations, which are the open environment, and we’re seeing a lot more trend toward open ceilings and more of an industrial look, high ceilings, etc., which creates that open atmosphere to foster communication.

That really is a continuing trend that we see. You have to work with the entire workforce— 20-year-olds, 40-year-olds, 60-year-olds—and, generationally, we all have a slightly different perception. One of the interesting things is when you take a traditional company that has a lot of private offices and you work with them to transition to a more open environment, there is always resistance to change—it’s not what people are used to. But, almost without exception, if you go back a year or two later, three years later, it’s the norm, and they say, “How did we ever operate in that other atmosphere?”

But change is tough, and so we work with it. It has to come from the top. The executives who are running the company have to buy into it—the fact that they are going to make that transition, but it works. It really does.

Q. Can you share some details about a corporate project you’re currently working on?

A. We’re currently involved in a very exciting project called Avenue North. It’s the former U.S. headquarters of AstraZeneca. They have a very, very large constituent there of employees. Subsequently, they have cut back. They are still on the campus, in one building—which we call the headquarters building, in which they still have a significant presence—but a local developer, Delle Donne & Associates, purchased the project from AstraZeneca and then leased it back. We’ve been going through all the development, working very closely with Landmark Engineering and Delle Donne & Associates, who is a fantastic client. Ernie Delle Donne is the president, and he has a wonderful vision for this space. It’s just outside the City of Wilmington in Newcastle County, but we’re working on multiple projects on this site: office buildings, retail, multi-family, perhaps a hotel. And, of course, as all development goes, it changes weekly, if not daily, in terms of the marketplace, but it’s all in for permitting now.

The thing that’s wonderful about it is that it will maintain the business at that site, which is a very prominent site. And, again, AstraZeneca had thousands of people working there, and with their consolidation, it would have created quite a void, but Delle Donne is able to step in and bring that site back to life.

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