A spaceship in Cupertino: Apple’s journey to build a new headquarters – The Verge

Apple’s spaceship is rising

2015-07-14T12:15:50-04:00

If you're a major company in Silicon Valley, it's becoming table stakes to have an awe-inspiring campus for your employees to head to every day. Google, Facebook, and Apple are all planning new buildings and workplaces (though Google's marvel recently hit a pretty major roadblock), and Apple's "spaceship" design promises to be among the most iconic office buildings out there. We're getting a glimpse at how construction is going thanks to an image that the city of Cupertino quietly released a few weeks ago that is making the rounds today - and there's no doubt that the giant, circular building is starting to slowly resemble what we've been og …

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Apple CEO Tim Cook says new spaceship campus will be ‘greenest building on the planet’

2014-09-22T18:14:36-04:00

Artist's illustration of Apple spaceship Campus 2 in Cupertino | Apple/Cupertino City Council

Apple is building an enormous new ring-shaped campus for its headquarters in Cupertino, California, the design and overall futuristic qualities of which have inspired the nickname "the Spaceship campus." Although construction on the campus (actual name Campus 2) has scarcely begun, Apple CEO Tim Cook is already boasting that that the building will be great for the rest of us earthlings who won't work there. Speaking today at the environmental nonprofit event Climate Week NYC, Cook said "we're building a new headquarters that I think will be the greenest building on the planet." (his comments start 1:15 into this video).

Apple has previously …

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Apple’s new spaceship is looking more like a landing site

2014-08-31T11:04:02-04:00

When it's complete, Apple's Campus 2 will resemble an enormous space disc descended upon the leafy suburbs of Cupertino, but as of today, it's looking more like a dustbowl landing site. Still, just seeing the outline for the futuristic new headquarters is impressive, with the nearby blocks of housing giving a good sense of the grand scale at which Apple's next home is being built. A GoPro-equipped DJI Phantom 2 drone has done an 8-minute aerial tour of the site, taking in a full 360-degree view of its surroundings and eventually descending for a closer look at the foundations presently being laid down.

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Apple’s ‘spaceship’ campus earns final approval from its home city

2013-11-20T04:44:44-05:00

Apple has received final approval for its planned "spaceship" campus from the city of Cupertino. The city council gave its formal approval in a vote on Tuesday, after it had unanimously agreed to the construction of the 176-acre California campus in October. Construction will begin with the demolition of the Hewlett-Packard office buildings currently on site later this year.

By agreeing to build the so-called Campus 2, CNET reports Apple will enter into a 20-year-long development agreement with Cupertino, and will increase the amount of tax it pays to the city. Last year Cupertino's council refunded $6.2 million of the $12.7 million in sale …

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New renders of Apple’s future campus offer glimpse of life at the spaceship

2013-11-11T11:31:31-05:00

Apple is set to receive final approval on its "spaceship" headquarters from Cupertino City Council on November 15th. The city has already unanimously voted in favor of the new campus, expected to open sometime in 2016, and is likely to continue that show of support with Friday's vote. But before it does so, the city has released yet more renders of Apple's future home. These new images provide some sense of what working there will be like - much like the obsessively detailed miniature model unveiled last month.

For the first time, we get a good look at the campus entrance (flanked by two huge Apple banners), an employee fitness center, and …

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Apple presents video of new headquarters ahead of Cupertino city council vote

2013-10-27T16:32:04-04:00

Showing all the polish of an Apple television spot, the company played a new video detailing its so-called Campus 2 - better known as "the spaceship" thanks to its enormous circular footprint - for members of Cupertino's city council last week. The presentation comes ahead of a planned November 15th vote, which would be a final approval before groundbreaking can begin. Architect Norman Foster makes an appearance in the clip, who notes that Steve Jobs told him "don't think of me as your client, think of me as one of your team" when the two first started working on Campus 2's design in 2009 (Jobs famously made an appearance before the council …

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Tim Cook celebrates Cupertino’s approval of Apple spaceship campus

2013-10-16T09:33:18-04:00

Tim Cook has a small reason to celebrate today, as Apple was finally given approval by the Cupertino City Council to build its new "spaceship" campus. "Our home for innovation and creativity for decades to come," Cook says of the campus in a tweet. Apple still has a long way to go before it'll be moving in, however. Should construction go as scheduled, the new campus won't begin holding Apple employees until sometime in mid-2016.

Our home for innovation and creativity for decades to come. Cupertino City Council Gives Unanimous Approval for Apple's New Campus
- Tim Cook (@tim_cook) October 16, 2013

The project has already been pushed back on …

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Apple’s ‘spaceship’ campus shown to scale in gorgeous miniature model

2013-10-11T16:09:42-04:00

We've seen plenty of mockups, renders, and even floor plans for Apple's proposed "spaceship" campus, but a new, intricately detailed model provides the best look yet at what Apple is hoping to build. The model you see above was shown to the San Jose Mercury News ahead of an October 15th Cupertino city council vote on the project.

And it's a sight to behold; the model provides a genuine sense of scale for the circular campus, parking structures, and other buildings Apple plans to erect nearby if given the OK. It also exudes an obsessive focus on detail. The perimeter of the spaceship itself is lit up to heighten the sense of realism, and you …

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Apple delays construction of secondary office building as part of Campus 2 budget savings

2013-04-25T09:17:06-04:00

Apple will delay the construction of a secondary research and development building on its "spaceship" campus in an attempt to drive down the cost of developing its new headquarters. In a filing with the City of Cupertino, Apple said construction of the office building on North Tantau Avenue will now commence as part of Phase 2 of its campus development, a delay that will see work begin once its iconic spaceship building has opened in 2016.

Originally scheduled for completion in 2015, Apple has been forced to push back its Campus 2 move-in date until the summer of 2016. When the campus was announced in 2011, the project already had a budget …

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Apple Campus 2 nearly $2 billion over budget and behind schedule, says Bloomberg

2013-04-04T07:53:02-04:00

Bloomberg Businessweek is reporting that the budget for Apple's new "spaceship" campus has risen from $3 billion to "nearly $5 billion." Citing five anonymous sources, the publication notes that the stretched budget would make Apple Campus 2 more expensive than the World Trade Center complex currently under construction. The project was originally scheduled for completion in 2015, but the move-in date has now been pushed back to 2016 as architects Foster + Partners search for a way to cut the current cost by a billion dollars.

The new campus was announced back in 2011 at what was to be Steve Jobs' last public appearance. Even at $3 billion …

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