CREVE COEUR, Mo. — First Bank plans to build a new headquarters in Creve Coeur that is expected to open in early 2024, featuring a design that reflects the dramatic changes in the workplace since the coronavirus pandemic began.
The bank anticipates that the current headquarters at 11901 Olive Blvd., where 74 employees work, will be demolished later this summer, with the new four-story building constructed in its footprint but closer to Olive Boulevard. First Bank’s branch at the site temporarily will move to an adjacent shopping plaza at 11921 Olive.
First Bank did not estimate the cost of the headquarters project, saying it’s a “moving target.” The current HQ, which opened in 1967, is 40,000 square feet and the new one will be 85,000 square feet, with non-branch employees consolidated from two other locations: 1 First Missouri Center in Creve Coeur and 600 James S. McDonnell Blvd. in Hazelwood.
Michael Dierberg, chairman of FB Corp., the parent company of First Bank, said the design of the new headquarters embraces a future with a largely hybrid workforce and is designed with the view that the overriding purpose of the building will be a meeting place for colleagues and clients.
The bank was looking for a place to consolidate offices before the pandemic began, but the analysis changed in the fall of 2020, he said.
“We said ‘this thing with Zoom and Teams, this is different and maybe there is something lasting about this.’ That is our conclusion, that this is a paradigm shift that we’re not going back to the way things were when everyone was in five days a week,” Dierberg said.
The design, led by Tyler Meyr at Lamar Johnson Collaborative, features a courtyard with electrical outlets that will enable employees to work outdoors, like many do in nice weather when they’re working from home.
Some employees now are expected to be in the office two days a week. Those days are scheduled so that teams are there at the same time and can be “intentionally social,” with lunch provided, Dierberg said. The new headquarters won’t have assigned offices. Instead, there will be “huddle rooms” where employees can meet and small spaces where they can make phone calls.
The first floor is expected to be divided between space for retail and commercial customers to visit, and an “innovation hub” where employees can hold large meetings, socialize, eat lunch and collaborate on projects.
Renderings of First Bank's new headquarters
As with other First Bank locations, the branch in the new headquarters will feature “interactive teller machines” — in which customers interact with tellers via video — and customers will be able to meet with in-person “banking specialists” to discuss financial planning.
Plans call for the fourth floor to have space for tenants, but it also could be used for offices as the bank expands, Dierberg said. There will be a view of Illinois on one side of the fourth floor and countryside to the west leading to Creve Coeur Lake. The bank also will have space on that floor to host clients and prospects.
Brinkmann Construction will manage the demolition of the existing headquarters and construction of the new one. Project guidance is being provided by Cobalt Construction Consulting and Cushman & Wakefield.
Read the rest of the story on the St. Louis Business Journal website.
