Who We Are

Our Story

We are an interdisciplinary design studio of architects, urbanists, graphic designers, product designers and visual communicators. Combining urban analytics, destination strategy, communication design and spatial design, we approach every place from several angles at once.

Spaceagency was founded in 2010 by Peter Feldmann and Sarah Manning. Peter, a German architect, had worked on buildings and masterplans at OMA, UNStudio and WilkinsonEyre. Sarah, an American based in London, had modelled how people move through space at Space Syntax. Both kept returning to the same question: why do some places feel instinctively legible while others don’t, and can that be designed for?

Our first commission, a wayfinding strategy with Zaha Hadid Architects for a large masterplan in Cairo, set the approach we still follow. We start with the person moving through a place, not the plan above it, and work across every scale, from urban strategy to the details read at arm’s length.

Today Spaceagency has studios in London, Milan and Guangzhou and 50+ designers and researchers from 19 countries. Our portfolio spans three consecutive World Expos, Riyadh’s giga-projects, and major transport, cultural and commercial projects across Europe, Asia and the Americas.

Our Vision

We believe the human experience of a place is paramount. We apply the principles of UX/UI design to the physical environment. We analyse how people move through and interact with a place, identify the moments that shape their experience, and create a consistent narrative across them.

We integrate communication, spatial cues and experiential elements with the architecture and urban design from the start, rather than adding them as a separate layer afterwards. We work across scales, from masterplanning and systems design to the human-scale products people encounter every day. The result is complex places made simple, intuitive and enjoyable to navigate, with each site's heritage and culture woven into the journey.

We collaborate with architects, developers, brands and municipalities worldwide.

We create the user interface for the built environment.

Chris Lepine
Zaha Hadid Architects

Founders

Peter Feldmann

Sarah Manning

Peter Feldmann is Co-Founder and Design Director of Spaceagency. He leads the studio's creative direction across wayfinding, identity, public realm and experience masterplanning.

Peter leads projects from start to finish, treating movement, narrative and identity as a single design problem. His projects include the Yas Island Welcome identity, the Expo 2030 Riyadh wayfinding strategy, Galaxy Entertainment Phase 3C in Macau, West Kowloon Cultural District, Eastland in Melbourne and Riyadh's Sports Boulevard.

Sarah Manning is Co-Founder and Strategy Director of Spaceagency. She sets the studio's direction in experience design, wayfinding and strategic planning.

Sarah leads strategy and experience design for complex, multi-stakeholder clients and has successfully delivered many projects around the world. She co-authored The Spaceagency Guide to Wayfinding, and her work has been exhibited at the Design Museum, Somerset House and New London Architecture.