Our first email from JLL Germany arrived on a Thursday morning in December. For our team at ZOA—trusted by ZAR Holdings, Zaha Hadid Architects, and Gensler—it was something unexpected: a major German corporate client operating more like a startup than a multinational real estate giant. What followed challenged every assumption we held about corporate collaboration and revealed the creative potential hidden within rigid constraints.
The campus story began in 2019 with a design competition, but by 2022, the client had re-evaluated its strategy and finally commissioned JLL to take over the architecture, project development, and execution—ultimately replacing the original competition design.
Our first project with JLL was communicating their completely reimagined vision for the same site. Despite being a global giant, they operated with direct communication, quick decisions, and no bureaucratic layers. They adapted to our workflow rather than imposing rigid processes. JLL had transformed from advisor to architect, taking full responsibility for design outcomes.
The campus in Bavaria became more than an architectural visualization project; this 400-workstation complex, featuring timber-hybrid construction that reduces embodied CO₂ by 55%, demonstrated how environmental ambition and collaborative processes can align to create something meaningful in architecture.