Apple's New HQ

[Plutonic Panda]

This thing is freaking crazy!

''Apple, Inc. is planning a glorious new headquarters in Cupertino, CA, and it's safe to say the design plans are "out of this world."

"It's a little like a spaceship landed," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said of the planned facility. "It's a circle, and so it's curved all the way around. As you know if you build things, this is not the cheapest way to build something. There's not a straight piece of glass on this building, it's all curved. And we've used our experience in making retail buildings all over the world now, and we know how to make the biggest pieces of glass in the world for architectural use."

The ring-shaped building will be 4 stories tall, with 4 floors of parking underneath. It will also be environmentally friendly, with its own energy production plant on site. Landscaping on the site will also be increased from 20% to 80%, with thousands of trees to be planted around the property. The new structure will finally allow all 12,000 of Apple's main employees to be under one roof, as they are currently spread around the city of Cupertino in rented office space. The current headquarters only holds 2,800 employees.

- See more at: OK WASSUP!: APPLE'S NEW HEADQUARTERS

[Plutonic Panda]

''Apple's (AAPL) Peter Oppenheimer, the cherub-faced high priest of finance for the world's most valuable company, gazed up at the oversized map on the wall.

"Let me begin by showing you the sea of asphalt,'' Apple's chief financial officer said, pointing to the husk of the former Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) campus in Cupertino, site of Apple's proposed new spaceship-shaped headquarters that goes before the City Council

The plan: flip a 175-acre site that's now 80 percent asphalt and buildings into one that's 80 percent open space and parkland, then drop a spectacular ring of polished glass into the middle of it all.

Perhaps channeling his former boss Steve Jobs at one of his high-anticipation product launches, Oppenheimer quickly went into full Apple pitch mode.

"You see the energy and the love and the attention to detail that we've put into this,'' he told this newspaper during a sneak peek of a top-secret, living-room sized model of the building. "We have treated this project just as we would any Apple product. And this will be a place for the most creative and collaborative teams in the industry to innovate for decades to come.''

Oppenheimer had every right to be gushing. With its jaw-dropping design from architectural superstar Sir Norman Foster and team, its stellar environmental credentials, and a tax-revenue windfall promised for Cupertino and the region, Apple Campus 2 promises to bring a world-class real-estate project -- along with a lot of traffic congestion -- to the heart of Silicon Valley.

Read more here: Apple's new headquarters: An exclusive sneak peek - San Jose Mercury News

[ljbab728]

But it has no street front appeal and isn't walkable.

[venture]

Just slightly old news.

[ljbab728]

Just slightly old news.

Yup, I've been seeing pictures of that building forever.

[Mel]

A new movie possibility for Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson.

[Bunty]

Skyscraper fans won't love it, but a massive skyscraper would probably look even more out of place in Cupertino.

[Plutonic Panda]

Steve Jobs Wouldn't Let His Kids Use iPads, And You Shouldn't EitherHigher Perspective

[David]

He also died from treatable cancer, largely from not treating it. Just because someone is an expert in one area it doesn't make them an expert in another.