Law offices make a motion to dismiss stiff, stodgy decor

No ships in bottles. No nautical charts. No dark wood paneling. And definitely no oil paintings of dead partners.

In other words, please, oh, please, don't make it look like a law firm.

That was Lauren Jennings's request when the Boston firm where she is managing partner, Posternak Blankstein & Lund, moved to the Prudential Tower. She wanted decor that was contemporary, unpretentious, and slightly off beat.

What she got is far from a stereotypical law office: a starkly minimalist lobby, colored sage and cream, furnished with snow-white chairs, flooded with natural light, outfitted with a glass-and-aluminum spiral staircase, and decorated with three lighted square panels whose colors can be changed like mood lamps.

``Law firms tend to be bastions of Old World stuff," Jennings said, ``but if you walk into almost any other kind of service, from advertising agencies to even our clients' offices, they aren't fuddy-duddy like that."

Law firms have begun to enter the modern age of design, shedding their fusty, dusty art collections and furniture in favor of a more chic image. Walk into many law offices today and you'll find photography, sculpture, abstract art, leather, stainless steel, sand-blasted glass, bold colors, and furnishings more residential than commercial, instead of Oriental rugs and grandfather clocks.

The shift has been driven in part by dramatically heightened competition in the legal industry that has many firms, large and small, scrambling to distinguish themselves.

Redesigns sometimes cause friction among lawyers with clashing artistic preferences. And how much to spend on decor can be a thorny issue, since lawyers aim to impress their clientele without making them wonder how much of their legal bills subsidize the firm's art collection.

The changes also reflect the influence of younger partners and younger clients, especially high-tech entrepreneurs whose tastes often run more Mass MoCA than MFA.

``Law firms, particularly in Boston, were always conservative by nature, but they've gone from caterpillars to butterflies," said Elizabeth Erdreich, a Boston corporate art consultant who works with dozens of law firms.

``They have transformed themselves -- they really have -- and their spaces are beautiful," she said. ``And the ones in Boston are getting just as cutting-edge as the law firm spaces I see in New York."

Perhaps nowhere is that more evident than at Brown Rudnick Berlack Israels, whose office at One Financial Center is so stylish that it resembles a night club. Visitors entering the reception area encounter stark white walls, black slate floors, a red leather bench, and an 18-foot-tall painting by the prominent minimalist artist Sol LeWitt, reminiscent of zebra hide.

``The way we see it, the art is integral to the design of our space and our architecture and our image, which we see as bold, forward-thinking, creative, and innovative," said Brown Rudnick partner Marilyn D. Stempler, who has a degree from Rhode Island School of Design and oversees the 200-lawyer firm's design efforts, which emphasize contemporary abstract works.

Not every firm is embracing splashy colors in the lobby. One that has retained an old-school image is the 33-lawyer firm of Melick, Porter & Shea, whose office at 28 State Street is conservatively furnished and decorated, complete with grandfather clock in the lobby. That traditional decor has carried over from its previous locations in the Back Bay and Beacon Hill, where it was housed in historic townhouses that lent themselves to a buttoned-up image, said managing partner Richard J. Shea.

The firm has many younger lawyers and maintains a casual-dress policy, ``so there's a little inconsistency with our artwork and furnishings," Shea said. ``But I do think our clientele expects that we will honor the tradition and legend of service that we've provided to them, so maintaining this continuity in our office decor shows that, even as we change, we still want to be the same to our clients."

But more and more local firms are shunning traditional dark woods, stone, marble, and thick carpet when they redesign their spaces or move to new offices. They are turning to lighter woods, glass, three-dimensional artwork , and area rugs and taking advantage of natural light, in the process making their offices more inviting for visitors and staff.

``The traditional law firm interior, especially here in New England, has been a very private, closed-door, sequestered aesthetic," said Lois Goodell, director of interior design for CBT Architects in Boston, which specializes in law firms. ``But they're realizing that a strong way to represent the personality and identity of the firm is through art."

Historically, law firms formed art committees to make design decisions, but art is so subjective that it was often difficult to reach consensus, resulting in conservative, noncontroversial decor.

As a result, some law firms have found other means to decide on decor .

``I don't think democracy is a term that should be associated with the acquisition of art in law firms, because it just doesn't work," said Thomas E. Dwyer Jr. of Dwyer & Collora, who conferred with only one partner when selecting the design theme of his office in the Federal Reserve Bank Building, which he describes variously as ``art wow" and a ``fireworks display."

The firm's lobby is an explosion of purple, orange, and yellow and features an artwork called ``Sprouts" that consists of 17 curly strands of neon light projecting from a wood flower box. The message is simple and straightforward, Dwyer said. ``This is a different place."

``When you're a boutique firm of 25 lawyers like we are, and you're competing against the biggest and the best and the brightest, it's important that you differentiate yourself," he added. ``And when you see this, you know it didn't come out of a Target catalog and that a lot of thought went into it."

Art can be a significant investment, and it can be tricky to find the line between impressive and extravagant.

``We didn't want anything that was going to make our clients walk in and say, `Gee, how much did I pay for that?' " said Jennings, of Posternak Blankstein & Lund, who said the 55-lawyer firm spent $53,000 on art. ``This modern look is more in keeping with who a lot of our middle-market clients are, and it shows them we identify with what's going on in the world today, rather than with what the traditional law firm was 100 years ago."

Posternak's stripped-down decor -- which is so minimalist that the firm's design consultant wanted no plants, artwork, or magazines in the lobby -- initially caused some ``fussing and raised eyebrows" at the firm, Jennings said. ``But nobody put their foot down and said, `Over my dead body.' And our clients love it."

Posternak client Arthur Barrett said, ``it's a pleasant surprise."

``It doesn't really change my opinion of the attorneys . . . but it has a nice, homey atmosphere that puts me at ease," said Barrett, who is president of Franklin-based Barrett Distribution Centers.

Money was also a consideration when Foley & Lardner , a 1,000-lawyer firm with 65 in Boston, wanted an airy, comfortable ambience at its office at 111 Huntington that would project a high-class image without costing an exorbitant amount, said managing partner Gabor Garai.

The firm made creative use of less-expensive materials, such as colored glass, hand-stitched leather, and fabric-embedded plastic panels that form opaque floral wall dividers.

To create a homey aura, it chose carpets and paints in soft hues, like beige and light blue, and bought furniture from a residential designer, despite having to fireproof it to meet commercial safety codes.

It also added funky twists, like a twisted metal staircase with small glass balls encased in the balusters. When it came to buying artwork, each of the roughly 15 partners contributed about $5,000 to buy numerous pieces, which Garai and his wife, co-managing partner Susan E. Pravda, bought at artist open studios in the Boston area.

``Many of our clients are entrepreneurs who are fast-growing companies and very noninstitutional," Garai said. ``And some of them find the typical institutional feeling of a law firm a bit put-offish, because it reinforces the idea that they're competing for the attention of lawyers with Fortune 100 companies.

``So we want people to feel like they're in a nice home or a boutique hotel, not a foreboding atmosphere," he said.

``It's spicy and cutting-edge," Pravda said. ``And it's fun for us and fun for our clients."

Sacha Pfeiffer can be reached at pfeiffer@globe.com.