Reading Roars!

The University of Reading is launching a facility designed to help people think ‘outside the box’. The Innovation Works, as this creative thinking space is to be called, will be unveiled to the world on Thursday 17 November by The Fat Duck superchef Heston Blumenthal (pictured).

The fourth facility of its type in the UK, and the only one in the South East, The Innovation Works will feature two brainstorming sections - a strategy and planning development area, and a chill zone. Users will be able to “bounce” new concepts around thanks to the facility’s curved walls.

Innovation Lab Project Manager Kate Pitts comments:

[The Innovation Works] uses the very latest technology, audio and visual equipment and lighting – it even has walls that you can write or draw on. We guarantee that the lab is unlike any other building you’ve ever worked in. We’re offering a unique experience which aims to change the way people think and work, and provides tangible results that clients can take away to build upon.

Wacky or what?

It is a great idea (did it, paradoxically, come from another Innovation Lab?), and one that will prove popular with businesses. Creativity and innovation are so important in business these days, yet companies give them too little attention. They shouldn’t: look at the iPod - a design masterpiece - and Apple’s soaring shares. The Innovation Works, it seems, is a sandpit for grown-ups, and soon every major corporation, I’m sure, will want to have one.