lego group hero
The custom desk and ceiling treatment in reception both reference Lego, while ducks made from the bricks nod to the Make Way for Ducklings children’s book and Nancy Schön sculpture in Boston Public Garden.

September 8, 2025

Words: Rebecca Dalzell

Photography: Eric Laignel

Brick By Brick: Rediscover Play at the Lego Group Boston Hub

Ask an architect how they got started, and there’s a good chance they’ll mention a childhood obsession with Lego bricks. “Our entire team loves them,” affirms Lydia Randall, director and ESG lead at BDG Architecture + Design, recalling building toy bridges with them. That history came in handy as she, creative director Mitch James, and their BDG associates conceived the Lego Group Boston Hub, otherwise known as the Danish company’s U.S. headquarters. Everyone intuitively understood how two Lego connect, she says, and that simple concept informed the design of the 157,000-square-foot workplace.

Lego grip together when round studs on the top of one piece click into the tubes on the bottom of another. “They interlock to give you a unique clutch power that holds your creation together but can be disassembled to make something new,” says Skip Kodak, a Lego Group senior vice president and lead executive for the Boston Hub. “It’s a key part of our brand. That versatility and ability to iterate had to come through here.”

Step Into a World of Imagination at the Lego Group Boston Hub

A round orange ceiling.
At the Lego Group Boston Hub, the Danish toy company’s six-level, 157,000-square-foot U.S. headquarters by BDG Architecture + Design, each floor has a color identity, which, in a collaboration area on six, is carried out in acoustic-felt Buzzijet pendant fixtures, Proto sofas by Nick Ross, and letters framed in clear acrylic filled with Lego bricks.

BDG has worked with the toy company for many years, formulating sales offices and production facilities around the world. But the Boston project is a much larger scale, a global hub for 800 employees spread across six floors. For 50 years, the Lego Group’s U.S. base was in Enfield, Connecticut; it moved to Boston to expand its capabilities and attract top talent. An inspiring workplace that forged a sense of community was crucial to this strategy. The Lego Group asked BDG to create an office that felt both playful and sophisticated, incorporating its identity in fresh and subtle ways. (Lego, by the way, is an abbreviation for leg godt, Danish for play well.)

The program includes a barista bar, more than 90 casual and formal meeting areas, and unique spaces like a novelty showroom and a creative play lab, where the innovation team explores ideas for new Lego sets. BDG conceived a floor plan that, Randall says, “creates attractive destinations and dynamic journeys up and down the building.” The team placed collaborative and social zones on the interior of each floor and open workstations along the perimeter, democratizing the views, which encompass Back Bay, Fenway Park, the Charles River, and the Emerald Necklace parks.

BDG Architecture + Design Brings Fun Into The Lego Group Workplace

A large white ceiling.
The custom desk and ceiling treatment in reception both reference Lego, while ducks made from the bricks nod to the Make Way for Ducklings children’s book and Nancy Schön sculpture in Boston Public Garden.

Circles representing the stud and tube of a Lego brick appear throughout in various scales, from penny tiles to meeting rooms. The scheme centers on a colorful spiral stair wrapped in tubular acoustic felt; a semicircular huddle space marks each landing. “We planned little moments of discovery and different types of areas for people to work in,” James adds. Employees may use curtained circular rooms for focused work or informal meetings, or hunker down in cozy nooks hidden under the stairs. They can also noodle around in a play space with buckets of botanical-themed Lego and green base plates along the walls, or idly stack pieces applied to the side of columns. For the Lego Group, the toy’s ubiquity is strategic. “Play helps people unlock potential,” Kodak explains, “because as they physically do something, it enables their brain to move as well, as opposed to being stuck.” Thus, there’s a bin of Lego in every meeting room.

It wasn’t easy to bring such playfulness into a professional setting. “A challenge with Lego is making it feel fun and creative without it looking like kindergarten,” James continues. “It requires a controlled use of color while adding different types of materiality, texture, and pattern.” BDG ensured that workspaces feel calm and neutral and reserved louder tones for common areas.

Unleash Your Inner Child at This Colorful HQ

A green and white office.
Custom lacquered-millwork islands with colored Formica doors anchor each pantry; this one on the green 8th floor also has upholstered Hula stools by Benjamin Hubert.

The team dialed back on the primary shades used in the brand’s logo and incorporated a wider palette that also informs wayfinding. Each floor has a color identity balanced with complementary hues. The reception level is green, a nod to the Emerald Necklace, while the barista bar is swathed in trademark Lego yellow. Passersby can see the stack of colors from the street.

And it goes beyond simply splashing bright paint on the walls. Color is brought in through a variety of materials, like ceramic tile, acoustic felt, and Formica. “The number of finishes in this project is massive—much more than we usually use,” James notes. For instance, in the pantry on the orange floor, the color appears on the lacquered island, pendant fixtures, and banquette upholstery; for the backsplash, glossy white tiles have circular reliefs that subtly reinforce the stud and tube motif. “There are repeated themes, so even if the color changes, there’s a sense of familiarity on every floor,” Randall says.

See How Legos Are Incorporated Into the Workplace Design

A bunch of orange and yellow lights.
Custom barista-area pendants made of Lego.
A white wall with four blue circles and a small figure.
Lego Minifigures in an elevator lobby.
A man in a suit and sunglasses looking at a lego wall.
Moveable Lego on a column.

Lego infuse the decor in surprising ways. In the elevator lobbies, painted high-density foam forms inspired by them serve as lift signs, and integrated circular niches contain Lego Minifigures chosen by employees. Pendants in the barista bar look like glass orbs but are in fact made entirely of Lego; BDG produced them in collaboration with the company’s model shop. The bricks also compose color blocks along the wall in reception, continuing in vinyl streaks across the ceiling—and a single, nearly 13-foot-long one in white solid-surfacing forms the desk. “Lego bricks are considered part of the architecture, they’re baked into the design,” James says. But that doesn’t make them any less fun: A line of plastic yellow ducks near the desk honors a classic children’s book set in Boston.

Employees are loving all of it. “The space has a spirit and an energy that makes them excited to show up,” Kodak says. Hybrid workers are spending more days in the office, and colleagues feel connected. And BDG keeps building this vibe: The firm is currently working on the Lego Group London Hub.

Inside The Lego Group’s Colorful Boston HQ

A man sitting in a blue couch in a room with colorful walls.
A Lego mural of the Boston skyline animates the 7th-floor collab area outfitted with Bob sofas by Thomas Bernstrand and Stefan Borselius and Ola Giertz’s LIV stools.
A close up of a red and white door mat.
Lego form the logo behind the reception desk.
A woman walking down a set of stairs.
Tubular PET acoustic felt wallcovering wraps the stairway; BDG worked with the structural engineer to design a stepped cut for circular stair openings, reducing the amount of material removed from the slab.
A building with many windows.
Floor colors are visible from outside the office, which occupies a 20-story new-build by Elkus Manfredi Architects.
A woman standing in front of a pink wall with a large red piece.
Knolling artwork with vertical lines of Lego hangs in an open office area.

Architecture Meets Imagination at This Workplace

A room with a lot of chairs and tables.
LED pendants and acoustic ceiling baffles curve above the town hall.
A woman standing in a living room with a couch.
Cork-rubber floors much of the office, including this pantry on 10 with a custom sofa and a Bond side table by Aust & Amelung.
A woman is walking up a spiral staircase.
The stair color changes depending on the floor, this stretch going from nine to 10.
A person walking through a colorful tunnel.
In reception, color blocks made of Lego transition to self-adhesive vinyl stripes on the ceiling.
A green table and chairs in a room.
RBW’s Print pendant, an Ionna Vautrin Pion table, and chairs by Form Us With Love furnish a huddle nook on 10.
A glass office with a curved wall.
Ceiling fixtures, acoustic rafts, and air-conditioning channels form concentric circles in meeting rooms enclosed by demountable glass partitions.

A Workplace Rooted In Creativity

A woman standing in a pink and yellow lobby.
Lukas Peet’s Column pendants, Santi Moix’s Flora Bloom rug, and a Lego raven mark the 10th-floor stair landing.
A large open space with a green ceiling.
Niels Diffrient Liberty task chairs and height-adjustable Q40 desks stand on ReForm Maze carpet tile in an open office area on eight.
A kitchen with a large orange circular light.
Pantry backsplashes are fitted with glossy ceramic tiles by Kho Liang Ie, this one on six also furnished with Vimini chairs by Patricia Urquiola.
A pink chair.
A mosaic mural made from Lego in a 9th-floor collab area.
A white plastic object with confettin spe.
A reception desk detail.
A lego man sitting on top of a toilet.
Another Lego Minifigure.
A pink wall with a bunch of people in it.
Elevator signs in painted high-density foam.
A lego plant with a purple flower on it.
A Lego Botanical set in a play space.
A room with a round table and chairs.
Johan Ansander’s Max chairs on the 7th-floor stair landing.
PROJECT TEAM

BDG ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN: TOBY NEILSON; TANIA BAGULEY; YATIN PATEL; JOYCE PUN; SHUCHEN WANG. MOBILE OFFICE ARCHITECTS: ARCHITECT OF RECORD. THE FURNITURE PRACTICE: FURNITURE CONSULTANT. ACRYLICIZE: BRANDING, SIGNAGE. LUX COLLABORATIVE: LIGHTING DESIGN. MCNAMARA SALVIA: STRUCTURAL ENGINEER. SYSKA HENNESSY GROUP: MEP. MARK RICHEY WOODWORKING: MILLWORK. STRUCTURETONE: GENERAL CONTRACTOR. OPTIMIST ADVISORY; REDGATE: PROJECT MANAGERS.

PRODUCT SOURCES

FROM FRONT
+HALLE: SOFAS, TABLES (6 COLLAB, 9 COLLAB), CHAIRS (NOOK). BUZZISPACE: PENDANT FIXTURES (6 COLLAB, PANTRIES). BLÅ STATION: SOFAS, TABLES (7 COLLAB), CHAIRS (7 LANDING). TURF DESIGN: CEILING BAFFLES (TOWN HALL), WALLCOVERING (NOOK). COR: SIDE TABLE (PANTRY). CREATACOR: CEILING VINYL (RECEPTION). FEELUX LIGHTING: NEON STRIPS. SANCAL: TABLE (NOOK). RBW: PENDANT FIXTURE. OBJECT CARPET: RUG. KVADRAT: CURTAIN FABRIC. ARCH STREET: PARTITIONS (MEETING ROOMS). BENTLEY MILLS: BLUE CARPET. NANIMARQUINA: RUG (10 LANDING). A-N-D LIGHT: PENDANT FIXTURES (LANDINGS). ARCHITECTURAL FLOORING RESOURCE: FLOORING (GREEN PANTRY). ANDREU WORLD: STOOLS. LUMENWERX: CURVILINEAR PENDANT FIXTURE (PANTRIES). TEGAN LIGHTING: CURVILINEAR COVE. EUREKA: PENDANT FIXTURES (OFFICE AREA). HUMANSCALE: TASK CHAIRS. HOLMRIS B8: DESKS. MOSA: BACKSPLASH TILE (ORANGE PANTRY). KETTAL: CHAIRS.
THROUGHOUT
ZANDUR: CORK-RUBBER FLOORING. EGE: CARPET TILE. FORMICA: CABINETRY. BENJAMIN MOORE & CO.; SHERWIN-WILLIAMS COMPANY: PAINT.

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