Facebook has brought in the famed architect, Frank Gehry, to design the expansion of the California headquarters in Menlo Park.
Plans for the 420,000 square foot plot will include a single-story warehouse with a roof-top garden that will cover the entire building. The expansion will be connected to the existing company HQ, "Facebook East", via an underground tunnel. Facebook's environmental design manager explained that "It will be be a large, one-room building that somewhat resembles a warehouse."
The new building is not only intended to appear like a warehouse, but instead to be a warehouse. The new warehouse building is expected to eventually hold 2,800 more employees all of which will be housed in the same room, with it being possible to walk from one end to the other without passing through a single door. Zuckerberg explained that "The idea is to make the perfect engineering space: one giant room that fits thousands of people, all close enough to collaborate together. It will be the largest open floor plan in the world, but it will also have plenty of private, quiet spaces as well."
Building is planned to begin in early 2013. The materials being used should allow for a quick build. Facebook intend for the building to be completed within 1 year.
Gehry has been one of the world's biggest architects since his Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao kicked off the international craze of provincial cities spending millions on extravagant cultural buildings as a route to wider regeneration. His post-structuralist buildings, whilst praised for the bravery of their design, are also criticised for putting form above function, and being both economically and environmentally wasteful.
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