New Apple Campus Nearing Completion, Expected to Open to Employees in April

CUPERTINO, CA -- The spaceship is almost ready to open.

Apple Inc. announced Feb. 22 that Apple Park, the company’s new 175-acre campus, is expected to be ready for employees to begin occupying in April. The process of moving more than 12,000 people is anticipated to take over six months, and construction of the buildings and parklands is scheduled to continue through the summer.

Apple Park, previously referred to as Apple Campus 2 and AC2, is an oval, spaceship-like structure that was originally envisioned by Steve Jobs as a center for creativity and collaboration. Over the past few years, the land on which the campus sits has been transformed from miles of asphalt into green space. The campus’ ring-shaped, 2.8 million-square-foot main building is clad entirely in the world’s largest panels of curved glass.

In honor of Jobs -- who would have turned 62 on Feb. 24 -- the new campus' theater is being named the Steve Jobs Theater. The 1,000-seat auditorium, which is expected to open later this year, is a 20-foot-tall glass cylinder, 165 feet in diameter, supporting a metallic carbon-fiber roof that's situated atop a hill, overlooking meadows and the main building.

Apple Park replaces five million square feet of asphalt and concrete with grassy fields and over 9,000 native and drought-resistant trees, and is powered by 100 percent renewable energy. With 17 megawatts of rooftop solar, Apple Park is expected to run one of the largest on-site solar energy installations in the world. It is also the site of the world’s largest naturally ventilated building, projected to require no heating or air conditioning for nine months of the year.

The Apple Park campus also includes a visitors center with an Apple Store and cafe open to the public, a 100,000-square-foot fitness center for Apple employees and secure research and development facilities, as well as two miles of walking and running paths for employees, plus an orchard, meadow and pond within the ring’s interior grounds.

Images courtesy of Apple Inc.