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Employees at Candy Crush's Swedish company work inside a polychromatic video game

Employees at Candy Crush's Swedish company work inside a polychromatic video game

Google’s gym-equipped, employee-coddling Silicon Valley headquarters pale in comparison to the Candy Crush–themed Stockholm offices of mobile game developer King, whose cartoon-splashed interiors aim to spur the creative juices.

Carousel booth seating and three-seater swing sets are just two of the places to put your feet up in the lounge, whose walls are splashed with cartoon vinyls of characters from King’s acclaimed game titles including “Diamond Digger,” “Bubble Witch Saga,” and the explosively popular “Candy Crush Soda.” In the Minnie Mouse House–like library, employees can luxuriate before a bright green, cartoonish-looking fireplace surrounded by winged armchairs in jarring mustard yellow and shocking pink.

Meanwhile, stressed-out mobile game developers suffering from cell phone elbow can blow off steam in a games room equipped with PS4 consoles and “Guitar Hero” guitar simulators. Swedish design agency Adolfsson & Partners aspired towards “a creative office landscape that communicates King’s soul, a place that with ‘fun’ and ‘magic’ as its watchwords can be called a ‘kingdom’.”

The office space is split over two floors within a large 1940s building located at Sveavägen 44. In the reception area, visitors are greeted at a white, egg-shaped desk.

Aesthetic flamboyance aside, work is work. Although the proverbial cubicle has not been dispensed with, potted plants and perforated partitions in attention-grabbing primary colors demarcate themed work spaces with names resembling game worlds—Green Hills, Treasure Island, Countryside, and Deep Sea—each with its own meeting facilities, private work rooms, and plush pillow-filled relaxation spaces.

Other areas are separated by mobile textile screens shaped like trees for sound insulation. Sandy Dunes, Mountain Tops, and Wild Jungle are just a few of the names assigned to the open plan offices on the second floor.

Needless to say, the games room, pinball hall, and a “party room” for all employees, sporting the comparatively mellow name “Pavilion Park,” were obvious investments. Meanwhile, a communal area split over the two levels called “Kingtown” is themed according to building sites, street art and outdoor life.

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