What in the hell was Bob Propst thinking? It's a reasonable question to ask as you survey the cramped confines of your standard-issue corporate cubicle and bathe in the dull glow of overhead fluorescent lights, all the while trying to ignore the sound of your colleagues' clipping their fingernails or blathering away on a speakerphone.
Propst is the guy who, three decades ago, dreamed up these modular boxes for furniture giant Herman Miller. As he envisioned it, the system of wafer-thin, movable walls would be a revolutionary tool that would break down rigid hierarchies, spur creativity and free work spaces from...