Gordon L'Estrange tells Bisnow he just left Lionakis to join Solomon Cordwell Buenz as director of interiors in S.F., where he'll help expand SCB's creative office workplace, residential and higher education interiors presence in the Bay Area. Speaking at our S.F. Creative Office and Tech event last month, above, he said tenants want to understand how to harness the design of their workplaces to increase productivity and innovation. Rather than just provide dense open office benching, scattered meeting spaces and exposed ceilings, he's helping tenants really examine the needs of their teams, designing spaces that provide a targeted balance of enclosed concentration and open collaborative spaces that allow for real individual employee choice in how they work.

Gordon says he's working with landlords to activate the common areas of their buildings to transition existing buildings from vertical islands to more of a vertical campus where accidental meetings between different tenants can occur. Gordon's followed SCB’s entry into the area for a number of years, he tells us. Principals Chris Pemberton (above, giving us a look at 299 Fremont) and Sheyla Conforte have helped score some sexy high-rise projects, such as One Rincon Hill, 100 Van Ness and One Oak Street (the new residential high-rise being designed at the corner of Market, Oak and Van Ness), along with a long list of corporate and creative office tenant interior projects.