A New Look for Google HQ

The renderings are part of a package released by the City of Mountain View in front of a City Council Public Hearing taking place on Tuesday, 7 March. It has been just over two years since it was revealed that the firms of Bjarke Ingels and Thomas Heatherwick would be working together to design the tech company's new headquarters. From the get-go, the joint design featured tent-like structures covering multiple volumes, though in mid-2015 the acreage allotted to Google shrank, sufficient for only one building.

The latest renderings show the development of the squarish, tent-covered building at the northwest corner of Charleston Road and North Shoreline Boulevard. The 595,000-sf (55,275-sm) building would consist of two levels over below-grade services. The roof, which is broken up by clerestory windows for daylighting the deep plan, would be covered in metal and photovoltaic panels. In addition to the office spaces catering to Google, the building would include a public cafe and retail on the first level, as part of a "Green Loop" pedestrian network cutting through the building and the site to connect Google HQ to other parts of Charleston East.

The landscaping around the building, designed by Hargreaves Jones Landscape Architecture, would consist of four main areas at the corners, created through the rotation of the building's square plan: "Hangout Hill," the "Sloped Savannah," a sculpture garden, and a public plaza at in the intersection of Charleston and Shoreline.