The innovative exterior of the Google Headquarters, designed by Christoph Ingenhoven, featuring a cutting-edge facade with sustainable design elements and modern architectural lines
The innovative exterior of the Google Headquarters, designed by Christoph Ingenhoven, featuring a cutting-edge facade with sustainable design elements and modern architectural lines
PROJECTS / GOOGLE HEADQUARTERS
Google HQ Palo Alto
More than 80% of all online searches worldwide are directed to Google. Due to the company's rapid growth, the Google Campus in Mountain View, California, is expanding quickly. The current headquarters, known as the Googleplex, is adjacent to Charleston Park. A significant new building is planned for the neighboring site. The urban setting requires a building with autonomous geometry. In an international design competition in 2010, ingenhoven architects proposed the winning design for this new structure. The client's request was straightforward: create the best and most health-promoting building in the world.
The new building, commissioned by Google for the first time, will accommodate 2,500 to 3,000 engineers, scientists, and top management. It is designed to be lively, fresh, simple, and flexible, offering healthy, communicative, and efficient work environments with a dynamic atmosphere. The architecture reflects Google's corporate culture while serving as a model of sustainable design, surpassing the LEED Platinum standard.
The new Google campus will feature a car-free landscape with publicly accessible amenities. A car-free "Google Boulevard," lined with shops, will serve as a central axis for light rail and cyclists. The office layout will be a continuous, flexible space with a tight circulation system and connections in all directions, maintaining clear orientation. The low number of floors will facilitate communication, and the inner vertical circulation will create visual connections. The building will be elevated to allow for a continuous landscape underneath and an “active roof.” The design blurs the boundaries between inside and outside, enabling people to enjoy the Californian weather and nature while living and working on campus.
Only indigenous, non-irrigated plants will be used, creating a fruit alley reminiscent of the orchards that originally characterized the site. Ingenhoven architects developed a master plan that included an urban analysis of all performance areas now described by the "Living Building Challenge": site conditions such as traffic, climate, soil composition, cultivation perspectives, conservation and reuse of materials, water, and energy. Embracing the principles of "Californian modernism," the design seeks harmony with nature, utilizing natural materials and simple technical solutions while maintaining a human scale.
Data
Competition, 1st prize
Execution 2012
Client Google
GFA 60,000 m²
Green Building LEED platinum
Credits
Local architect
Gensler
MEP / Civil Engineering
Glumac and Sandis
Sustainability
Glumac and DS-Plan
Structural Engineering
Magnusson Klemencic and Werner Sobek
Facade design and special structures
Werner Sobek
Cost
Davis Langdon
Facade access
Lerch Bates
Kitchen and food
RAS Design Group
Landscape architecture
Gustafson Guthrie Nichol
Light design
OVI/Tropp
Traffic and parks
Fehr & Peers and IPD
Elevators
Edgett Williams Cons. Group
Waterproofing
Simpson Gumpertz & Heger
Fire protection
The Fire Consultants
Acoustics
Glumac- Charles Saulter
