A lot of the furniture in a typical office, public building and other meeting spaces has both direct and indirect effects on morale, mental well-being, physical health and by extension productivity.

One of the best examples of this in action is found with water coolers, which are not only essential for keeping people healthy and able to bring their best, but have a remarkable social function as well.

As everyone needs to stay hydrated, staff members will take the trip to the water cooler, which leads to plenty of opportunities to chat about work, about life and about the news in general.

These water cooler culture moments are often where teams truly coalesce, get to know each other better and ultimately work with each other to bring out their best side. It is the work equivalent of a third space, a social space separate enough from your desk to allow for a true engagement with a workplace.

It is such an important cultural touchpoint that the term “water cooler moment” is commonly used for a major event that brings even strangers in the same office together as they have a common topic to talk about.

This could be a news story, music on the radio or even TV shows, with the latter often designing storylines around fostering water cooler moments.

Whilst the concept has existed for as long as television has and as long as water coolers have existed in offices, the 1980s and 1990s were when appointment television became a national pastime discussed whilst drinking a glass of ice-cold water.

Moments such as the plane crash in Emmerdale, the shooting of J.R. Ewing in Dallas, half of the storylines on Brookside, the fade to black which ended The Sopranos and countless other examples were the talk of offices everywhere.

The concept has seen a revival in recent years with shows such as Game of Thrones, Happy Valley, Line of Duty and The Last of Us restoring the concept of the television “event”, one that has the inadvertent side effect of giving people something to talk about and bond over at the water cooler.