What do planners wear to the office, what do the offices look like?

[CubbieBlue]

RJ, you cannot wear white after Labor Day. People in polite circles will whisper about you. Winter white is OK, but only after the first snow. Breaking these rules is almost as bad as a lady attempting to wear an off-the-shoulder or strapless dress before sundown. It just isn't done.

If I ever saw a man wearing white pants I would make fun of him no matter what type of circle I was in.

[strumpeace]

I wear khakis and a button-down shirt M-Th and jeans and polo on Friday. I always keep a jacket and tie (that will match most anything) in my office 'just in case'.

[Suburb Repairman]

Small, college-town city of 50,000 in Texas...

Daily dress is business casual: khakis and a button-up shirt typically. Classic blue-shirt planner look.

Meeting with elected/appointed Council/Commission: business professional (suit & tie)

Friday: Nice jeans and a polo, with casual shoes (no sneakers, flip flops, etc.)

I keep a khaki sport coat at work in case I for some reason need to kick it up a notch.


I'm a mid-level manager with a private office. Office is probably 12x12, with a window into the hallway and a window looking out at the railroad tracks (I've seen one car hit since working here). I keep the blinds open to both windows--the interior so my co worker across the hall can have natural light spill in to her office (I also keep my door open for this reason, and so we can shout back & forth to one another). I have two HUGE lateral filing cabinets in my office. I have a U-shaped desk with a bookshelf. I have two guest chairs and a couple of plants.

We are going to remodel our offices at some point in the near future to accomodate our multi-department reorganization, new employees, meeting rooms, and more efficient document storage (I'm working on designs). I anticipate we will end up with cubicles for many employees, but I will try to design them with good access to natural light, comfort & privacy, etc.

[Cardinal]

My current office is typical - 12x12 with a wall of windows overlooking the street out front. Previously it was the loft in my house in Colorado, with a wondow from which I could see the peaks of Rocky Mountain National Park. Before that, another 12x12 space with fortress-like slits for windows, overlooking a park. Going further back I was in a 20x25 spce with 16-foot ceilings, oak paneling, shelves, and a fireplace. These are exceptions. I think it is a rule, though, that most planning offices have to be located in a basement, have exposed, asbestos-wrapped pipes hanging from the ceiling, buzzing flourescent lighting, and furniture that was surplus from World War Two.

As for dress, it is pretty much casual. This is getting to be true for most jobs in most places.

[cch]

We wear jeans in my office, with nice shirts. And I'll wear slacks or chinos if I am going to a meeting or something. But, at the other two jobs I had we only got to wear jeans on "casual fridays". At my job now we each have our own office with windows. But, we are in the partial basement of the old section of the courthouse, so out my window I have a nice view of a retaining wall. There are a lot of books piled up, but that is mostly up by the receptionist desk, near the map table. Our furniture doesn't match, and much of it doesn't function properly. And the radiators under each window making a rattling sound.

From my experience.. the more metropolitan the jurisdiction, the more likely you'll be in a newer state of the art building. But, the downside is that you'll also likely be in a sea of cubicles.

[SDplanner]

We're pretty casual at our So Cal office, M-Th slacks button down shirts and jeans are okay on Friday. We only need to dress more professional for client meetings, presentations at public meetings and the like.

[graciela]

How we dress here:
Pretty much anything that resembles business casual goes as long as it is not jeans (until Friday then jeans are a go). If we have a meeting the lady planners (myself included) step our outfit up a bit and put on some makeup. The guys will don a sweater vest over their polo for a meeting and if it is court or commission they will break out a tie.

Our office:
Standard drab government office. Most all of us have offices (10x10), a few are larger and one of them houses two planners. Our arborist is stuck in a cube. The furniture is a lovely eclectic mix of 70's government surplus. Nothing in my office matches and my walls look a bit skanky due to a lack of spackling and re-painting. We all have lots of stuff in our offices that reflects our personalities as well as unwanted junk from previous tenants.

None of our offices have windows but we do have plenty of fluorescent lighting to cast its cheery rays across our workspace.

[DetroitPlanner]

We typically wear business clothing to work, but compared to the other tennants in our building we a definitley more casual (Lawyers, consultants.) We are expected to be able to attend meetings at a momment's notice. The local shops selling ties seem to know our male staff. Since this is Detroit, it is not unusual for male staff to wear hats ranging from Fedoras to ball caps to touques in the winter. If you don't know what a touque is, you live too far from Canada!

My office is a cubical of about 10' by 12'. The building itself is a gothic gangster type of building from the roaring 20's. It is one of the more cooler skyscrapers in Downtown Detroit. The floors we occupy were redesigned for our needs about 8 years ago and contain several meeting rooms. The building was seleted because it is a short walk from most transit lines in the CBD, and even next to a People Mover station. I was able to get a walk around prior to demo, and the floors were previously a hodge-podge of tiny old office suites or poorly done mazes. Nearly everything was demoed, though I would have loved to have one of the old offices with the window up top and my name on a glass door. Everything flows pretty well on my floor and it is defintely set-up for more casual work relationships. The view out my window is of an alley and the building across the alley. Sometimes I get to hear the bums fighting about stuff in the dumpster.

[jmello]

Dress: business casual (polo shirts and khakis), suits and ties for big meetings, no jeans

Office: modern downtown bank building turned city offices (reflective glass and stucco), we each have our own office (10x10) with very large windows and mahogany-colored furniture.

[NickSticks]

Dress: Monday through Thursday is typically business attire, usually nice slacks and a long sleeve shirt. Depending on who we are meeting with I will either wear a tie or a full suit. If we are meeting with architects or designer types I will wear the suit sans tie. Fridays is usually nice jeans, loafers/slip-ons, and a button down shirt, sometimes with a blazer if its cool out.

Office: We are located on the 11th floor of a downtown high rise building. Since the management of the firm would foremost consider us to be an architecture and design firm, all of our offices have been designed by our in-house interior designers to look the part. All of the office furniture is provided through Ikea Business and the few pieces that aren't Ikea have been custom designed to look like it. Therefore everything is very modern and angular. Workspaces consist of corner desks, a bookshelf, and a layout table. Associates and partners all have offices with large exterior windows and a front glass wall which allows lots of natural light into the office. Since the workspaces have low walls we can all get a view of "the outside" just by turning around or poking our heads up over our monitors.

[abrowne]

Interesting reaction to white pants through this thread!

Mid-sized city and the dress is fairly casual because of the personality of the City as a whole. Friday is jeans and a polo. Some even wear untucked all week long, though I don't condone that. Most days are some sort of dress pant or business casual pant with a button down collared shirt. Ties are extremely rare, only worn by the General Manager (he is above the Director of Development Services), and only occasionally at that.

My cube is fairly large and rectangular. I'd say 6' by 12' or so. Office building is early to mid 80s in construction, or it has aged especially well and is from the late 70s. No openable windows which drives everyone mad. Offices with doors tend to be surprisingly small in size and often a disadvantage because of solar gain. It is policy of the City that all new employees get plants given to them for their desk. It's cute, and I appreciated it.

I have 2 under-desk filing cabinets (4 drawers total) with another under-desk unit with 2 drawers and 1 more file drawer. Have a decent dell computer and a laser printer. Two huge overhead bins for active files and bylaws, plans, etc. Desk space is adequate in lineal distance but as usual I find it too shallow in depth. I prefer deeper desks.

I should just post a photo.

One nice touch is that there is an open alcove with hangers for coats and jackets. This has been a definite shortcoming of past offices I've worked in.

[Planit]

We are in a 1913 former school, planning staff is in the basement. I have a 9' x 11' office with a window that looks to our rear parking lot and vacant lot (covered by kudzu) beyond that. The two other planners share a 12' x 32' office.

Wear slacks and polo/button dwon shirt during the week, but allow jeans and polo on Fridays. Wear tie for meetings and presentations. Have sport coat on back of door for "surprises" a.k.a. unscheduled meetings.

Beats cubeland from the private sector.

[nrschmid]

My office: 10"x12", large window, 10' exposed wood ceilings, exposed air ducts, piping, and window trim are all forest green. I don't have partitions, but rather 1' thick white walls 7' in height capped by a wood trim. Plenty of wood bookcases (half of the planning library collection is in my office, the rest is in the actual library here). I have two desks, one is on rollers, both wood (so pretty nice in general). I would post pics but I can't seem to attach files to posts anymore.

Attire: business casual M-F. Ecologists are more likey to wear jeans if they are out doing fieldwork. Will wear suits for evening meetings, meetings with clients, conferences, etc. We have a very "unofficial" casual Friday, which the owners are trying to get rid of. Most of my jeans, t-shirts, hoodies are new but they have a very beat up/distressed look so I don't wear that in the office unless I come in on the weekend.

[natski]

I always where business attire, except with a personal funky twist i guess, with fun jewellery, hair accessories, colours, funky shoes etc.

I always look presentable, but i would say unique! I am not afraid to wear dresses to work either!