Office move

We are moving from a PhD office, RCS 1.114, to another one, RCS 1.103.

Apparently, from the names, you can tell they are on the same floor. But it is actually a bit of a walk, from one end near the Dyson Building to the other end adjacent to the Sir Alexander Fleming Building. It is somehow nice to sit in the only red-brick building in South Ken campus. Story is that when Dyson Foundation gave the funds to build the Dyson School, this Victorian building was purchased from the Science Museum, and has been the Dyson School’s location ever since.

I have had some memories in the old office. My whole PhD life until now was in that office. I spent quite a lot of time there, especially in the first year of my PhD when I still lived close to campus. I almost came in every day back then.

It is a big office with 36 desks, but back then it was never at full capacity — probably because during and after Covid, people started to shift all their work home and had not shifted back.

Claire and Alasdair sat next to me. The three of us were at the very end, the most inside row of the office. Although to be more accurate, Claire was often in the lab, and Alasdair was often working from home or at his military base. So it was not like the three of us were always there together.

At the end of the day, we could hear the Science Museum announcing exactly:

It is now 5:30. The museum will be closed at 6 o’clock. Please make your way to the exit…

Weirdly, it is somehow one of the strongest memories I have of that office.

The office changed with us

The old office had its transition over the years.

It was not fully 36 desks at the start, and we were not sitting at the end row back then. But soon after I started, we moved there. The HEAD lab occupied the three end-row desks and the three desks opposite, so the whole row was all us. Yanyu was here, but she did not really stay long. She quit soon after joining, for reasons unknown to me. Rachel was here for her RA position around 2023/24, and we went for walks and lunches because we were the people who came in most.

Later the department added more seats to make the office 36 desks, details somehow I couldn’t remember much. Also, with the online meeting demands in the office, they added three silent meeting pods. Later, they transformed it a bit more, adding a breakout space at the other end of the office. It was nice and considerate. Mazdak, as DPS, organised doughnut breaks there, and we chatted.

The kitchenette next to 1.114 is nice as well, with sufficient space for a table for six, and of course a fridge, a sink, and a microwave. Although it is shared between our office and the Digital Learning Hub next to us, we do not complain. One thing we did complain a bit about was not having a coffee machine with endless coffee supplies. The department said there was already a machine, but they would not supply coffee.

The new office

Now that we have moved to 103, the new office is brighter, with larger windows and a better view directly facing the Skempton Building, with trees and bike racks outside the window. It also has a water fountain and a printer just outside the office. It is also closer to our new lab — room 108, just opposite it.

A kitchenette within the office is not really a kitchenette, but a much smaller space squeezing in a kettle, a sink, a fridge, a few cabinets, and a microwave. The full tabletop is already occupied.

I moved away from the old office, closing the memory there, just at the very moment that I am now bringing my PhD to a close and starting a new postdoc project. The new office has its problems. But I am looking forward to the new life — office-wise, physically, and perhaps project-wise as well.