Multiple architectures and the production of organizational space in a Finnish university Tuomo Peltonen Tampere University of Technology, Tampere, Finland Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to report a study of architectural development and organizational meanings and uses of space in a Finnish university. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws from actor-network theory and Lefebvre’s spatial-social approach to shed light on the organizational assumptions of the various building phases and how current employees use and make sense of the architectural space in the case organization. The methods used include participant observation, interviews of employees and architects, and interpretation of planning documents, architectural statements and administrative representations of the complex. Findings – It took over 30 years to build the campus. The original plans for the university buildings were substantially revised as architectural and organizational paradigms changed over time. However, regardless of the more recently built state-of-the-art facilities, the early architectural design ideas have persisted as material-social forces that participate in the ongoing production and reproduction of organizational space. Originality/value – Despite of the recent surge of writings on organizational space and architecture, there are relatively few empirical studies done on the topic. In particular, analyses investigating the travel of design ideas from architectural planning to actual physical constructions and further to the everyday organizing practices of employees have so far been rare in organizational literature. This paper partially fills this gap. Keywords Finland, Universities, Architecture, Space utilization, Organizational history, Users Paper type Research paper 1. Introduction Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in buildings and space in organizational studies (Burrell and Dale, 2003; Cairns, 2002; Clegg and Kornberger, 2006; Dale, 2005; Dale and Burrell, 2008; Elsbach and Pratt, 2007; Halford, 2004; Hernes, 2004; Knigma, 2008; Kornberger and Clegg, 2004; van Marrewijk, 2009; Taylor and Spicer, 2007; Yanow, 1995, 1998). Following the inspiration of approaches such as Lefebvre, 1991; Taylor and Spicer, 2007; Watkins, 2005 spatial-social analytics as well as the preoccupation of actor-network theory with the role of material objects as organizers of spatial-social relations (Fallan, 2008; Gieryn, 2002; Latour, 1988, 1991), along with other theoretical stimuli (Dale, 2005; Dale and Burrell, 2008; Guille ´n, 1997; Linstead and Ho ¨pfl, 2000), the production of the social in the realm of organizations is seen as being intertwined with the material objects and physical structures of the workplaces and corporations. Within organizational analysis, an interest in architectural materiality and space offers a complement to the underlying idealism and duality of cognitive and discursive analyses of organizations (Clegg and Kornberger, 2006; van Marrewijk and Yanow, 2010; Orlikowski and Scott, 2008), emphasizing instead the embodied The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/0953-4814.htm JOCM 24,6 806 Journal of Organizational Change Management Vol. 24 No. 6, 2011 pp. 806-821 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0953-4814 DOI 10.1108/09534811111175760