When noise wears work down
62% of French employees report being disturbed by noise at work. In office environments, noise annoyance has become the leading cause of dissatisfaction among open-plan occupants — ahead of temperature and lighting. It erodes concentration, lengthens cognitive recovery time and increases mental fatigue. And it resists the usual answers: adding absorbent panels is not enough when the problem is not only physical, but perceptual.
Orange made a rare choice: not to treat noise as a nuisance to be corrected after the fact, but to orchestrate the sonic experience of its workplaces as a fully fledged component of quality of life at work. The DRHG-QVCT department, led by Frédéricke Sauvageot, called on my expertise as a sound scenographer, and that of my partners, to conduct this approach.
Listening to twenty sites before designing
With acoustician David Guérin (Gantha), a fifteen-year fellow traveller, we carried out the sound audit of twenty of the group's office sites: acoustic measurements cross-referenced with a qualitative analysis of the occupants' lived experience — what they hear, what they feel, what wears them down and what soothes them. This dual reading, quantitative and perceptual, is the foundation of the approach: we do not design for decibels, we design for people.
From this audit came strategic recommendations and sonic journey guidelines: a shared grammar for thinking about sound in Orange's workspaces — zoning of atmospheres, treatment of thresholds and transitions, balance of sonic densities, legibility of spaces for concentration, exchange and retreat.
Starting from perception, not from equipment
The guiding thread of this mission is that of my whole practice: understanding uses before designing sounds. Psychoacoustics — the way the brain interprets perceived sound — makes it possible to move beyond the reflex of "always less noise".
You can reduce noise — and increase discomfort. The right answer combines sonic sobriety, the staging of silences and a balance of densities: never aggression, never an unsettling void. Spaces that soothe rather than exhaust.
An award-winning approach, a published method
The approach was distinguished by the QVT Trophy 2023, in the Hybrid and flexible work organisation category, awarded to Orange. It has since been documented in the journal Écho Bruit (no. 184, January 2026), in a methodological article co-signed with Frédéricke Sauvageot: how to transform the sound environment from an endured nuisance into a lever for wellbeing and cognitive performance.
"Working with Marc Debiès profoundly renewed our approach to sound. Together, we designed a sonic journey starting from auditory perception and users' felt experience. By taking psychoacoustics into account, we were able to create work environments that are clearer, calmer and more inclusive."
The full Écho Bruit article is available on request — get in touch.