Illustrative worked example. This is a realistic brief run through Echo using the same method a real report uses — not an account of a named past client. See every case study for more, including which of these are real, permissioned projects as they're added.
The brief
A Head of Workplace at a 40-desk fintech scale-up needed to close a specific gap ahead of a WELL Silver assessment: every feature was on track except reverberation time, flagged by their assessor as a likely fail in the open floor.
Open-plan floor, converted warehouse building
22 × 14 × 4.2 m, about 1,294 m³ — exposed brick walls, polished concrete floor, no suspended ceiling — services and structure left exposed by design.
Hard on every surface and no ceiling to absorb into, the floor was sitting at roughly 0.9 seconds — well short of WELL v2's threshold, and the direct cause of the video-call and concentration complaints that had prompted the wider workplace review.
The standard, and the target
WELL v2's reverberation time feature sets an upper limit of 0.5 seconds for open workspaces — tighter than the 0.6 seconds it allows for an enclosed conference room, because an open floor has nowhere for a voice to go but into everyone else's calls.
The constraint
The exposed-services look was a deliberate, non-negotiable part of the fit-out brand, so a suspended ceiling — the fastest route in most offices this size — was never going to be proposed, and wasn't.
The decision
The fix stayed entirely below the services line: ceiling-hung rafts sized and spaced to leave the ductwork and cable trays visible, fabric-wrapped panels on the two longest brick runs, and acoustic booths for calls specified as a separate, non-counted improvement to concentration rather than part of the reverberation-time fix itself.
Every route considered, vendor-neutral — we don't sell any of it.
- Ceiling rafts, hung clear of servicesabout 210 m²
The main move — sized to leave every duct and cable tray visible from the floor.
- Fabric-wrapped wall panelsabout 90 m²
Placed on the two longest brick runs, where desks sit closest to a hard wall.
- Acoustic booths for calls4 booths
Recommended alongside the fix, not counted in the reverberation-time figure — a different problem (call privacy), same budget conversation.
The outcome
The model predicts rafts and wall panels would bring the floor to roughly 0.48 seconds, predicted to reach WELL v2's 0.5-second open-workspace target, with the ducts and cable trays left visible. This is a design-stage prediction for an illustrative room, not a measured result.
Indicative figures for this example, from the same method a real report uses. Not a measured survey and not a compliance certificate — where one is required, that's a survey to BS EN ISO 3382-2.
Now do it for your room.
Four questions, about a minute. Free to see whether you have a problem.
Check my room →Questions people ask
Will this get us through WELL testing?
Echo cannot say. WELL results come from on-site testing carried out for the assessment itself. Echo gives a design-stage prediction, so you can size the fix before that test happens. It is not the test, and it is not a guarantee of a pass.
Why were the booths recommended but not counted?
They solve call privacy, not reverberation time across the open floor — folding them into the same figure would overstate what the reverberation-time fix is actually doing.
Could the target be predicted with less area?
Possibly, with a like-for-like ceiling instead of exposed rafts. That was ruled out by the brand brief before the acoustics were discussed, which is normal: the acoustic answer has to sit inside the design answer, not override it.