They’re going postal.
A utilitarian apartment building amenity — the mailroom — is getting a glow-up, as developers consider new ways to put the fun in functional, according to a new report by Fast Company.
Shifting shopping habits and work patterns, as well as updates to building codes and USPS regulations, are contributing to an overhaul of the oft-overlooked spaces.
The concept isn’t completely new — a 2018 Wall Street Journal story compared mailrooms in some high-end developments to posh private post offices.
The mailroom at One Hudson Yards, for example, boasts backlit Brazilian quartzite and glossy stone flooring.
The construction of the mailroom in Tribeca’s prestigious 56 Leonard condominium required knocking out an entire lobby wall in order to install special granite floors, the Journal reported.
But it’s no longer just ultra-luxury developments giving mailrooms the five-star treatment.
Julia Lauve, a Dallas-based interior designer, told Fast Company that modern mailrooms are coming out of the shadows. Lauve’s firm, Workshop Studio, builds lounge-like mailrooms with sofas, wood panelling and moody lighting.
Lauve called one such mailroom “an extension of the lobby,” rather than leaving the space “an afterthought and tucked away.”
In a time when apartment dwellers can furnish their entire homes via online shopping, it’s no wonder that mailrooms are getting more attention.
Not only do these spaces require more high-tech security to house mountains of precious parcels – Amazon lockers, key-coded doors and surveillance cameras – they simply require more space.
Remote work is also influencing the future of mailrooms. The post-pandemic surge in remote work has motivated multifamily residences to offer lonely desk jockeys spaces outside of their apartments to work.
Such spaces have few requirements — a smooth tabletop, free wifi, an outlet and maybe some natural light. Designers like Lauve ask, why can’t such spaces be found in the mailroom?
Regardless of whether a building wants to cater to more creative uses of the mailroom, growing the footprint of these overlooked rooms is becoming a regulatory necessity.
Sheena Brittingham, a managing partner at a Portland-based design firm, told Fast Company that housing code changes are further pushing the evolution of these neglected rooms.
Recent revisions to the Americans with Disabilities Act and enhanced turning radius requirements in common areas have necessitated the expansion of even the most standard of mailrooms, the outlet reported.
In addition to allocating more space, updated postal laws are compelling new residential properties to build these spaces in more visible, highly trafficked areas.
United States Postal Service standards revised in 2020 require multifamily buildings to place their mailrooms within a reasonable distance of where the mail courier parks their delivery vehicle, Fast Company reported.
As a consequence of its encroachment, the mailroom now demands the same aesthetic attention as the lobby.
“We don’t want it to feel like you’re going down some creepy corridor to get your stuff,” Brittingham told the outlet.