Entering the lobby of the Vancouver office of Slack Technologies Inc., I am hard-pressed to sense the presence of a corporate culture. Nested in a 1911 Yaletown warehouse, the four-level workplace more closely resembles some of my favourite local cafés. A unique and unpretentious character (no shopworn hipster tropes like vintage Edison bulbs) and plenty of spots to set up my laptop. Nothing to suggest a global operation with offices in four major cities, whose market valuation recently surpassed $5-billion amid rumours that Amazon and Google are circling the company.  
Slack Technologies Inc. Vancouver office. Photo: Ema Peter
The Slack app, launched in 2013 by Vancouver software prodigy Stewart Butterfield (who also helped develop Flickr) caters to my demographic: tech-savvy, convenience-craving millennials. Quicker and more interactive than email, the app allows electronic messages to be sorted by people, group and topic?separately or all at once. People can quickly jump in and out of conversations, and charming bots sometimes pop up to monitor the talk. Its disciples believe that Slack will soon replace email as the primary mode of online communication; for some offices, it already has.  And now Leckie Studio Architecture + Design has transformed Slack?s Vancouver office into an environment that is much like the app: casual, collaborative and user-friendly?made possible by careful attention to the design principles...