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You Won’t Believe Work Gets Done at These Three Google Offices

By Katherine McLaughlin

Google offices may have slides, climbing walls, nap pods, and basketball courts, but they aren’t adult playgrounds, at least not wholly. “I think that the assumptions are very surface level,” Joshua Bridie, Google’s director of global interior design, tells  AD . Movies like  The Internship and video tours of the tech giant’s workspaces have long offered glimpses into the home bases of Googlers across the globe, prompting common adjectives to surface when discussing the infamous spaces: colorful, playful, animated, or fun. And though these descriptions are true, social media or theatrical adaptations often fail to encapsulate the most essential adjective required to detail the Google offices: intentional. 

“From day one, Google’s founding principles with our products were that they had to be user first,” Michelle Kaufmann, Google’s director of research and development for the built environment, says. “And that’s certainly how we think about our spaces too.” In Google’s 24 years, the company has pushed the office to its limits, operating on a belief that if the people who are working there are happy, healthy, and comfortable, then the company itself will thrive too. It’s in this idea that the jungle-gym-like elements that Google offices are known for become as integral as a desk or a filing cabinet. “They’re there because there is a need for the brain to disconnect and reconnect, so you can refocus your energies in an incredibly productive way,” Bridie says. 

Of course, it’s not just playful and whimsical design that makes a Google office—many factors inform the look and feel of these notable spaces. Below, Kaufmann and Bridie take AD through three of the company’s workspaces to show just what makes a Google office. 

Pier 57 (New York City)  

A 300-foot-long ramp that once transported cargo and buses was converted to provide a multimedia experience to welcome both Googlers and visitors. 

Whether working on a ground-up building or renovating an existing structure, the goal of every Google office is longevity and timelessness. “We think about every office very similarly, which is ‘how can we make a building that is functional and vibrant for hopefully centuries?’” Kaufmann says. Unable to predict the future, the company opts to look to the past for buildings that have achieved this lofty objective. “It turns out there were five main common properties,” Kaufmann explains: high ceilings, double-height space, access to daylight, long span between columns, and exposed structure. It’s largely this design skeleton that defines almost any Google space. 

Exposed structure is a common element of Google offices. 

A cantilevered room with views of the Hudson River at Pier 57. 

From this core, Google designers look to incorporate three types of spaces: those designed for deep focus work, for collaboration and meetings, and to build community and spark innovation. Many of these core elements of a Google space are on display at the company’s Pier 57 office in New York City: large windows open up to incredible views of the Hudson River, “neighborhoods” for teams are created within the relatively open floor plan, and numerous cafés and informal meeting spaces make room to decompress or ignite curiosity. 

Bay View (Mountain View, California)  

The central courtyard at Bay View features mariposa-inspired artwork, while skylights along the canopy roof allow plenty of natural light in. 

Designed by Bjarke Ingels Group and Heatherwick Studios, Google’s Bay View campus is the company’s first completed ground-up project. “We had always been in existing buildings, and it’s only really been in the past five to seven years that we’ve actually been designing ground-up buildings for ourselves,” Kaufmann says. With a tent-like ceiling and floor-to-ceiling windows throughout the building, the Bay View campus is easily one of the most unique offerings in the company’s real estate portfolio. However, it also represents Google’s push for sustainability. “We have this crazy, audacious goal of being carbon neutral by 2030 on a 24/7 basis with all of our buildings, including data centers,” Kaufmann explains, adding that Bay View exemplifies many of the strategies the tech company plans to implement to achieve this. 

90,000 silver solar panels make up the canopy roof at Google’s Bay View campus. 

Courtyards connect the collaboration and amenity-focused lower floors with the second-floor focus areas. Here, Googlers gather around the Dinosaur District courtyard and its towering T-Rex sculpture by Marianela Fuentes.

Instead of checking off standard environmentally friendly boxes—like using recycled materials—Google designers look to make their sustainability efforts just as beautiful and exciting for employees as they are for the Earth. “It’s about being sustainable while thinking about how we can create an extraordinary user experience,” Kaufmann explains. At the Bay View building, solar panels on the roof mimic a dragon’s scale in a visually interesting and original way, while a landscaped retention pond acts as an on-site wastewater treatment center, for example. “Thinking about sustainability from a user-first perspective is our unique approach,” Kaufmann says. 

Peachtree (Atlanta)  

A custom Google Atlanta sign and peach-shaped arch welcome guests and employees. 

Though the Google offices all have similar backbones, they each have their own flair too. “We want our spaces to be cousins, not identical twins,” Bridie says, adding this is often done by leaning into the design vernacular of the local community. Often, the company partners with local design firms and artists to not only better understand the area, but to truly embed the community in the office. “We’re tying to understand that local community and establish an aesthetic that is truly part of that region versus my interpretation of that region,” he says. In the newest Atlanta office, murals painted by local artists don the walls of a coffee bar, a peach-shaped arch welcomes employees to the office every morning, and upcycled cassettes donated by local Googlers reference the city’s musical history in a creative mural. 

Murals from local artists inspired by various themes in Atlanta’s history decorate this coffee bar and several others at the Peachtree offices. 

A mural made from recycled cassettes donated by Atlanta Googlers. 

Still, despite the purposeful designs, what truly makes each office unique is the people who move in. “Sometimes the spaces that resonate the least with me become the most popular with the Googlers,” Bridie says. “There are some things that might make design professionals uncomfortable, but I celebrate because it truly means that they now feel like they own the space, and that, to me, is success.” 

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Google’s Plan for the Future of Work: Privacy Robots and Balloon Walls

The company that helped popularize open office plans and lavish employee perks is trying to reinvent office spaces to cope with workplace sensibilities changed by the pandemic.

Credit... By Cayce Clifford

Supported by

By Daisuke Wakabayashi

Photographs and Video by Cayce Clifford

• Published April 30, 2021 Updated Oct. 7, 2021

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Google ’s first office was a cluttered Silicon Valley garage crammed with desks resting on sawhorses.

In 2003, five years after its founding, the company moved into a sprawling campus called the Googleplex. The airy, open offices and whimsical common spaces set a standard for what an innovative workplace was supposed to look like. Over the years, the amenities piled up. The food was free, and so were buses to and from work: Getting to the office, and staying there all day, was easy.

Now, the company that once redefined how an employer treats its workers is trying to redefine the office itself. Google is creating a post-pandemic workplace that will accommodate employees who got used to working from home over the past year and don’t want to be in the office all the time anymore.

The company will encourage — but not mandate — that employees be vaccinated when they start returning to the office, probably in September. At first, the interior of Google’s buildings may not appear all that different. But over the next year or so, Google will try out new office designs in millions of square feet of space, or about 10 percent of its global work spaces.

The plans build on work that began before the coronavirus crisis sent Google ’s work force home, when the company asked a diverse group of consultants — including sociologists who study “Generation Z” and how junior high students socialize and learn — to imagine what future workers would want.

The answer seems to be Ikea meets Lego. Instead of rows of desks next to cookie-cutter meeting rooms, Google is designing “Team Pods.” Each pod is a blank canvas: Chairs, desks, whiteboards and storage units on casters can be wheeled into various arrangements, and in some cases rearranged in a matter of hours.

To deal with an expected blend of remote and office workers, the company is also creating a new meeting room called Campfire, where in-person attendees sit in a circle interspersed with impossible-to-ignore, large vertical displays. The displays show the faces of people dialing in by videoconference so virtual participants are on the same footing as those physically present.

In a handful of locations around the world, Google is building outdoor work areas to respond to concerns that coronavirus easily spreads in traditional offices. At its Silicon Valley headquarters, where the weather is pleasant most of the year, it has converted a parking lot and lawn area into “Camp Charleston” — a fenced-in mix of grass and wooden deck flooring about the size of four tennis courts with Wi-Fi throughout.

There are clusters of tables and chairs under open-air tents. In larger teepees, there are meeting areas with the décor of a California nature retreat and state-of-the-art videoconferencing equipment. Each tent has a camp-themed name such as “kindling,” “s’mores” and “canoe.” Camp Charleston has been open since March for teams who wanted to get together. Google said it was building outdoor work spaces in London, Los Angeles, Munich, New York and Sydney, Australia, and possibly more locations.

Employees can return to their permanent desks on a rotation schedule that assigns people to come into the office on a specific day to ensure that no one is there on the same day as their immediate desk neighbors.

Despite the company’s freewheeling corporate culture, coming into the office regularly had been one of Google’s few enduring rules.

That was a big reason Google offered its lavish perks, said Allison Arieff, an architectural and design writer who has studied corporate campuses. “They get to keep everyone on campus for as long as possible and they’re keeping someone at work,” said Ms. Arieff, who was a contributing writer for the Opinion section of The New York Times.

But as Google’s work force topped 100,000 employees all over the world, face-to-face collaboration was often impossible. Employees found it harder to focus with so many distractions inside Google’s open offices. The company had outgrown its longtime setup.

In 2018, Google’s real estate group began to consider what it could do differently. It turned to the company’s research and development team for “built environments.” It was an eclectic group of architects, industrial and interior designers, structural engineers, builders and tech specialists led by Michelle Kaufmann, who worked with the renowned architect Frank Gehry before joining Google a decade ago.

Google focused on three trends: Work happens anywhere and not just in the office; what employees need from a workplace is changing constantly; and workplaces need to be more than desks, meeting rooms and amenities.

“The future of work that we thought was 10 years out,” Ms. Kaufmann said, “Covid brought us to that future now.”

Two of the most rigid elements in an office design are walls and the heating and cooling systems. Google is trying to change that. It is developing an array of different movable walls that can be packed up and shipped flat to offices around the world.

It has a prototype of a fabric-based overhead air duct system that attaches with zippers and can be moved over a weekend for different seating arrangements. Google is also trying to end the fight over the office temperature. This system allows every seat to have its own air diffuser to control the direction or amount of air blowing on them.

If a meeting requires privacy, a robot that looks like the innards of a computer on wheels and is equipped with sensors to detect its surroundings comes over to inflate a translucent, cellophane balloon wall to keep prying eyes away.

“A key part of our thinking is moving from what’s been our traditional office,” said Ms. Kaufmann.

Google is also trying to reduce distractions. It has designed different leaf-shaped partitions called “petals” that can attach to the edge of a desk to eliminate glare. An office chair with directional speakers in the headrest plays white noise to muffle nearby audio.

For people who may no longer require a permanent desk, Google also built a prototype desk that adjusts to an employee’s personal preferences with a swipe of a work badge — a handy feature for workers who don’t have assigned desks because they only drop into the office once in a while. It calibrates the height and tilt of the monitor, brings up family photos on a display, and even adjusts the nearby temperature.

In the early days of the pandemic, “it seemed daunting to move a 100,000-plus person organization to virtual, but now it seems even more daunting to figure out how to bring them back safely,” said David Radcliffe, Google’s vice president for real estate and workplace services.

In its current office configurations, Google said it would be able to use only one out of every three desks in order to keep people six feet apart. Mr. Radcliffe said six feet would remain an important threshold in case of the next pandemic or even the annual flu.

Psychologically, he said, employees will not want to sit in a long row of desks, and also Google may need to “de-densify” offices with white space such as furniture or plants. The company is essentially unwinding years of open-office plan theory popularized by Silicon Valley — that cramming more workers into smaller spaces and taking away their privacy leads to better collaboration.

Real estate costs for the company aren’t expected to change very much. Though there will be fewer employees in the office, they’ll need more room.

There will be other changes. The company cafeterias, famous for their free, catered food, will move from buffet style to boxed, grab-and-go meals. Snacks will be packed individually and not scooped up from large bins. Massage rooms and fitness centers will be closed. Shuttle buses will be suspended.

Smaller conference rooms will be turned into private work spaces that can be reserved. The offices will use only fresh air through vents controlled by its building management software, doing away with its usual mix of outside and recirculated air.

In larger bathrooms, Google will reduce the number of available sinks, toilets and urinals and install more sensor-based equipment that doesn’t require touching a surface with hands.

A pair of new buildings on Google’s campus, now under construction in Mountain View, Calif., and expected to be finished as early as next year, will give the company more flexibility to incorporate some of the now-experimental office plans.

Google is trying to get a handle on how employees will react to so-called hybrid work. In July, the company asked workers how many days a week they would need to come to the office to be effective. The answers were divided evenly in a range of zero to five days a week, said Mr. Radcliffe.

The majority of Google employees are in no hurry to return. In its annual survey of employees called Googlegeist, about 70 percent of roughly 110,000 employees surveyed said they had a “favorable” view about working from home compared with roughly 15 percent who had an “unfavorable” opinion.

Another 15 percent had a “neutral” perspective, according to results viewed by The New York Times. The survey was sent out in February and the results were announced in late March.

Many Google employees have gotten used to life without time-consuming commutes, and with more time for family and life outside of the office. The company appears to be realizing its employees may not be so willing to go back to the old life.

“Work-life balance is not eating three meals a day at your office, going to the gym there, having all your errands done there,” said Ms. Arieff. “Ultimately, people want flexibility and autonomy and the more that Google takes that away, the harder it is going to be.”

Google has offices in 170 cities and 60 countries around the world, and some of them have already reopened. In Australia, New Zealand, China, Taiwan and Vietnam, Google’s offices have reopened with occupancy allowed to exceed 70 percent. But the bulk of the 140,000 employees who work for Google and its parent company, Alphabet, are based in the United States, with roughly half of them in the Bay Area.

Sundar Pichai, chief executive of Alphabet, said at a Reuters conference in December that the company was committed to making hybrid work possible, because there was an opportunity for “tremendous improvement” in productivity and the ability to pull in more people to the work force.

“No company at our scale has ever created a fully hybrid work force model,” Mr. Pichai wrote in an email a few weeks later announcing the flexible workweek. “It will be interesting to try.”

Daisuke Wakabayashi covers technology from San Francisco, including Google and other companies. Previously, he spent eight years at The Wall Street Journal, first as a foreign correspondent in Japan and then covering technology in San Francisco. More about Daisuke Wakabayashi

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• Our Thinking

April 19, 2016

What can we learn from Google’s offices about workplace design?

Office putting-greens, vintage subway cars and revolving bookcases are among the zany features that can be found in Google’s charismatic offices. Google is renowned for its unusual and extraordinary workspace designs as part of its model of motivation.

Although the offices may look cool, there is in fact reasoning behind their take on workspace. In this blog, we will explore the ways that Google makes use of its office space to “create the happiest, most productive workplace in the world.”

Those that sit together, work together

Over the decades there has been a great deal of research investigating the importance of physical space within the workplace and how it affects employee motivation. Studies showed that within a workplace that encourages collaborative working, that productivity increases by 15%.

In contrary to old fashioned office structures designed by hierarchy (senior management on the upper floors and juniors on the lower floors), studies show that it’s necessary for people of all levels to work together to create and share information. This concept has slowly, but surely, started to infiltrate office culture.

Employee motivation – the Google way

At Google, office culture promotes “casual collision” between employees. This is paramount in demonstrating how collaboration promotes creativity and drives production.

Google’s culture focuses more on their employees rather than the results themselves. While Google also provides the standard perks including no-cost health and vacation benefits, and in keeping with its philosophy that “life at Google is not all work”, what contributes to this culture is its unconventional workspace design.

Is this unconventional design productive?

While some of Google’s offices across the world may seem somewhat alternative: an office putting-green and authentic jungle (Dublin), beach volleyball and climbing walls (California), an authentic New York apartment styled conference room and a virtual library with secret, revolving bookcases leading to other departments (New York), such extremity does have its benefits. But, how does work actually get done?

To ensure that Google creates the perfect workspaces for their employees, everything from the corridors and ornaments to the colours of paint are carefully analysed.

Each workspace is designed to stimulate creativity and ultimately encourage social interaction with members from structurally separate teams – someone who an employee wouldn’t normally network with. Google intentionally hires people who are ambitious and that have established accolades of fantastic achievement. They can therefore be confident that through a combination of vigilant hiring and delivering an employee-friendly workplace environment, their staff will always perform to the best of their ability.

The 150 feet from food rule

If we take a look at Google’s New York headquarters, Googlers believe that there is an energy of diversity in the city itself and that is reflected in the workspace. No part of the office is more than “150 feet from food”. Whether there is a restaurant, coffee lounge or cafeteria, employees are encouraged to snack more, chat more and, most importantly, inspire more.

This ‘casual collision’ reinforces that all employees are there to work and help one another, just as New York itself is a hub for interaction. Regardless of common interests and values, neighbouring colleagues are more likely to get on.

And in an office where ‘casual collisions’ are encouraged (Google’s New York office has a number of notoriously slow elevators forcing workers to use ladders and corridors), people from different departments are more likely to engage in unexpected conversations and generate new, inspiring ideas.

Are these ‘out-there’ designs worth it?

So, what can we learn from Google’s wacky workspace designs? The design of an office has to reflect today’s evolving work environment, and collaborative working is becoming increasingly popular. And as the world’s number one search engine, Google must be doing something right!

At Workspace Design, we understand that collaborative working could coincide with your office’s culture. Here are a number of key features that make for a collaborative workspace:

• An open plan to encourage collaborative collisions • Additional common areas – coffee bars, cafeterias, lounge rooms etc. • Areas that are designed for more than one person, rather than single-occupancy

For more advice on how to make the most of your collaborative workspace, get in touch today.

And if you can think of any more benefits of Google’s unique workspace designs, be sure to send us a tweet or send a message on Facebook – we always love to hear from you.

Office Chit Chat: Getting the Right Balance

Five office design ideas for a small office.

An interview with global google office interior designer firm

Interview with Stefan camenzind (executive director) and Tanya ruegg (creative director) of   evolution design   ltd ., the swiss architectural firm who has a large portfolio of office projects. And who also happens to be responsible for developing a number of Global Google Office Interior Design. They tell – how they respond to the changing communal Google office interior space, and convey the tech company’s strong culture of open communication and creative collaboration into work environments that foster innovation.

In this interview with evolution design, originally published on The Designboom as “ Interview with evolution design, the firm behind many of google’s global offices, ” Andria Chin speaks with Stefan Camenzind and Tanya Ruegg, about the many inspirations of the Global Google Office Interior Design. image ©adam drobiec

Inspiration Behind Google Office Interior Design

Db : what original made you want to study architecture.

Stefan camenzind:  I was always interested in understanding why things are the way they are – therefore it was very often a mystery to me why buildings looked the way they looked. so I think it was first of all my desire to better understand the built environment in which we live, which made me study architecture. having said that, it still puzzles me today why many buildings look the way they do.

Tanya ruegg:  I have always wanted to create something that will make people feel better, happier, something that will enhance their personality. designing innovative architectural solutions that are tailor made to suit people’s needs and reflect their values seemed to be the perfect challenge for me.

DB: What particular aspects of your background and upbringing have shaped your design principles and philosophies?

SC:  people are very much shaped by the values they have been brought up with. in my case these were very much the values of fairness and respect for others opinions, which still drives my design philosophy today.

TR:  I grew up in a loving family with great values of respect and understanding. this has given me the necessary stamina, and lots of positive energy, to create for other people. this is why ‘human centered architecture’ is the architecture I believe in.

DB: your firm is responsible for designing several Google office interior across Europe. how did you start collaborating with the technology company?

SC:  as often, this happened by chance. we were invited to pitch for the zurich Google office interior and as we had never designed an office interior before we had to think about it from fresh.

TR:  therefore we didn’t suggest to Google a design concept but a design process! a process, which would enable the google office interior to be the best possible workplace for their staff.

• Read more about modern office interior design concepts.

DB: were there specific requirements or themes that google wanted you to maintain across each office site?

TR : no. Google is very much aware that their staff is their most valuable asset and therefore we always interact only with the local googler’s to make google office interior totally unique for them and provide them with the best possible functional requirements they need.

SC: Google has such a strong company culture, which is all about open communication and collaboration, creativity and innovation, food and fun. once you are designing the ‘look & feel’, the Google office interior start having a similar language, which naturally connects them all.

SC: Most clients who come to us want us to help them to develop their workplace strategy for the future. this means we normally don’t have a brief, but develop it together with the client.

TR:  for this we do quite a lot of research, for which we have developed specific tools for, desk and meeting room utilization studies, work style research, workshops and interviews. this is not only about the functional requirements, but also very much about the vision for the future and the company culture and values. only based on this we start developing our office design concepts

DB: how have you as architects responded to the evolution of the communal office space in your designs?

TR:  it is usually the other way round – based on our research we understand what the current and future needs of people are and we create designs, which enable this. already when we researched our first Google office interior in Zurich, we understood clearly that more creative spaces to meet, collaborate and exchange were needed in the future.  accordingly we designed a large number of very different creative spaces to meet, play, drink coffee and exchange ideas.

SC:  during the last years the need for this kind of spaces has increased dramatically and in Google office interior at tel aviv already half of the office floor is dedicated to these kind of creative communication hubs.

DB: what are some of the approaches you take to ensure that both individual and group activities can be carried out within the same space?

SC : whatever you do, always create a sufficient amount of quiet working areas, which enable people to get away from all the hustle and bustle. being distracted by noise is the biggest problem people face in an open plan office concept.

TR : More importantly this brings us to the question ‘how has work changed’. we can clearly see in all our research the trend that people are less and less at their desk and much more active in different places in and outside the office. instead on their desk they are in workshops, team meetings, project work, or are collaborating with others. clearly the standard office, which has mainly desks, cannot be the solution for these changing requirements. therefore much more creative workplace solutions are required with a multitude of different work settings to support optimally all these new activities as mentioned above.

DB: in what ways have technological advancements affected the way you design and complete projects?

SC : technology is clearly the key!

1. to the way business is changing on a global and local level. 2. to the way the workplace can respond the theses fast changes.

all our projects therefore follow the simple IT principles of < everything everywhere > :

• – all employees with laptops, soft phones and mobile phones
• – excellent WiFi bandwidth everywhere
• – electricity not just on the table and in meeting rooms but also in all informal places
• – laptop chargers also provided in in all informal and break out areas
• – screens to connect to in all informal and break out spaces as well
• – security settings enable working from anywhere outside the office

DB: as architects, could you outline your own work habits on a day-to-day basis?

SC : In our office it is very simple – we give our team the IT tools they need and thereafter everybody decide themselves where and how they want to work. I for example are answering these questions while working from abroad and while having numerous whatsapp and skype video calls with the different teams in the office and our clients.

TR: But of course we are normally in the office because we work very much collaboratively. this means we have for each project a large scrum meeting project wall, where we plane the daily and weekly activities and deadlines. for example, I switch constantly between focused work on my own to collaborative work with others.

DB: in your opinion, what is the future of the workplace?

SC: The future of the workspace is certainly more and faster collaboration and interaction with less and less borders of companies and countries. the future advancements in technology will dictate the speed of the change. all we know today is that we already need to design for the future change.

TR: As the world of business is constantly changing with little certainty, people have a much stronger ‘desire to belong’. this is why it will be even more important in the future that Google office design creates unique identities, which are reflecting the company culture and values. thus enabling people to identify and be proud of their workspace and the company they work for.

photo: peter wurmli

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Company announcements

Rethinking office space

Feb 27, 2015

[[read-time]] min read

Not the sexiest title for a blog post, I know. But as we’ve inhabited a variety of workplaces—including a garage in Menlo Park, a farmhouse in Denmark and an entire New York city block—we’ve learned something about what makes an office space great. And we’re excited to put that into practice, starting here at our home in Mountain View. Today we’re submitting a plan to redevelop four sites—places where we already have offices but hope to significantly increase our square footage—to the Mountain View City Council. It's the first time we'll design and build offices from scratch and we hope these plans by Bjarke Ingels at  BIG  and  Thomas Heatherwick  at Heatherwick Studio will lead to a better way of working.

The idea is simple. Instead of constructing immoveable concrete buildings, we’ll create lightweight block-like structures which can be moved around easily as we invest in new product areas. (Our self-driving car team, for example, has very different needs when it comes to office space from our Search engineers.) Large translucent canopies will cover each site, controlling the climate inside yet letting in light and air. With trees, landscaping, cafes, and bike paths weaving through these structures, we aim to blur the distinction between our buildings and nature. Of course, this project is about much more than just office space; it’s about doing more with the local community as well. So we’re adding lots of bike paths and retail opportunities, like restaurants, for local businesses. We also hope to bring new life to the unique local environment, from enhancing burrowing owl habitats to widening creek beds. And we’re committed to do everything we can to save energy—our recent agreement to  offset our energy consumption in North Bayshore with renewable energy  includes the development of this proposal.

We chose Mountain View for our headquarters 15 years ago because we love the beauty of the bay, the close proximity to great universities, the family-friendly environment and the chance to work in a city at the heart of Silicon Valley. Today, we want to create office spaces that don’t just provide a great home for Google, but which also work for the city that has given us so much. We look forward to working with our neighbors at the City Council on this proposal—and the future of Mountain View’s North Bayshore.

Google's Proposal for North Bayshore

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Google buildings: office architecture design

Google architecture interiors, New offices buildings, Modern meeting spaces, Workplace architectural images, New campus

Google Buildings: New Office Architecture

Modern Office Interior Developments – Architectural Information + Architects + Images

post updated 12 February 2024

Google Architecture 2019 – 2023

Contemporary Google Property Designs – recent architectural selection on e-architect below:

We hope to add more Google buildings on e-architect soon.

Google Buildings News 2016 – 2018

We aim to post more Google building designs here on e-architect soon

Google Buildings Designs 2006 – 2015

11 Oct 2008 Google’s Global Workplace Strategy Presented in Berlin with Workplace Partner Dr. Andrew Laing of DEGW Google Offices Munich A first-time peek at Google’s successful workplace strategies was the highlight of an international conference for corporate real estate professionals in Europe and beyond. The global strategic design consultancy DEGW announced that its Managing Director for North America, Dr. Andrew Laing, spoke at the 2008 CoreNet Global Summit in Berlin with Jason Harper, an executive from Google Germany. The subject: Why Google’s global workplace strategy has been so successful.

Office Architecture Designs

Office building designs

Office Architectural Designs – selection below:

Office Buildings

Comments / photos for the Google Buildings – modern workplace design and meeting facilities around the world page welcome.

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Design an Office that People Want to Come Back to

• Andrea Vanecko,
• Jonathan Ward,
• Robert Mankin

How one company redesigned its headquarters during the pandemic to meet its employees’ evolving needs.

The workplace trends that accelerated during the pandemic aren’t going away. Companies should use this moment to improve office environments in a way that boosts employee engagement and well-being, thereby encouraging attendance, increasing retention, and attracting new talent. The authors, who designed the Hana Bank headquarters during the Covid-19 crisis, recommend a few best practices: consider what the space is for and name it accordingly, listen to what employees want and need, experiment within your own walls, and bring in partners to add value.

As the Covid-19 crisis enters its third year and the Omicron variant surges, organizations around the world are contemplating how, when, and even if to have their knowledge workers resume regular in-office hours. And they do so at a time when the views and priorities of their employees have shifted. A recent  McKinsey study  showed that well-being, flexibility, and work-life balance are top of mind. A survey Microsoft conducted  last year indicated that 41% of the global workforce would consider switching jobs in the next year, with 55% noting that work environment would play a role in their decisions.

• Andrea Vanecko is a principal at NBBJ, who partners with clients such as Google, WarnerBros, and LinkedIn to rethink office design.  
• Jonathan Ward is design partner at NBBJ and has designed creative environments for clients ranging from BlackRock and LinkedIn to Montage Health and the Westmark School.
• Robert Mankin is a partner at NBBJ and leader of the firm’s workplace design practice. He has worked with clients including Amgen, Samsung Electronics, and Tencent.

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Google Mexico / SPACE

• Curated by ArchDaily
• Architects: SPACE
• Area Area of this architecture project Area:  600 m²
• Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2013
• Photographs Photographs: Eric Velazquez Torres
• Manufacturers Brands with products used in this architecture project Manufacturers:   Trespa , Novotech , Tektil
• General Contractor : ATXK
• Production / Realization Technology:  Interface and EGE carpet, certified wood, resin liquid elements, artificial grass, USG ceiling and walls. The VW is rescued from a dump cars.
• Architect In Charge:  Juan Carlos Baumgartner, Jimena Fernández Navarra
• Design Team:  Ramiro Pulido, Ricardo Hernandez
• City:  Mexico City
• Country:  Mexico
• Did you collaborate on this project?

Text description provided by the architects. As one of the leading web browser companies, google needed to grow in the building they were. The design concept is really simple…the city of Mexico.

When you enter the reception you find this really white space, with a bright colored logo, that lets you in into two different spaces. One, the techtalk, a big auditorium for multiple uses. Here the focus of design is the Mexico city google map carpet, which captures you eye the moment you step in.

The other door let you into Mexico city. First you see Chapultepec, an informal meeting space with swings, a lake and a very big tree. Then you see that the carpet is actually a street that takes you everywhere. You can take an actual refurbished cab and have a phone conversation, or you can take the subway, that holds all the technical rooms in the office.

You can continue your journey either south, and find workstations and Xochimilco, where you can have a videoconference inside a Trajinera, which is a traditional Mexican boat; or you can go north, and enter Teatro Blanquita, a big meeting space where Google Hangouts happen.

Food and catering is really important for the company to give to their employees, so you can find a deli in the middle of the space where you can either eat or meet. There are also several amenities such as gym, showers and massage areas to keep the employees happy. Color and lighting design worked together to really enhanced the look, the productivity and the result.

Designed to have little impact in the environment, this offices follow really strict green guidelines such as low VOC´s materials, green carpeting, certified wood, and recycle bins. This offices got LEED Gold Certified.

Google works totally different as the majority of companies, and because this is a young company with most employees being gen-Xers we decided to give a fun yet functional ambiance, or as they call it “frugal space”.

OPERATION / FLOW / INTERACTION:

The space is like entering mexico city, you find a park in the middle where you can have informal meetings, or just play in the swings and the pond. Then you find the café just beside the public transportation examples: the metro and a taxi cab that you can use to have videoconferences or phonecalls. You go south to find the open space of the city, where the people work. And a Xochimilco style Trajinera that is actually a formal meeting room. To the other side you find a huge meeting space with a google map as the carpet .And finally You can enter Teatro Blanquita, the space where google hangouts take place. Please enjoy and live Mexico City.

RESEARCH ABSTRACT:

Possibly the most important challenge in the design process of a new space is the ability to align space and business. This alignment requires specific methodologies to identify the goals and objectives of an organization and generate a diagnostic of how space can be a tool in the pursuit of success. Space has developed a unique methodology that is designed to generate this strategic alignment. The Discovery session brings together the heads of the organization and using two diagnostic card games are determined on one hand the most important concepts related organization: Economic Value Attraction and retention Organizational Culture Corporate Identity The second set of cards is called brandspAce, it focuses on determining the emotional profile of the organization. In a world that increasingly generate experiences about a brand becomes a determining factor, define what emotions represent the organization is essential. As a result of this phase space given a diagnosis on what document will have a series of recommendations that can be used later in the design and development of the project.

The most challenging part of designing this office was to gain the Leed Gold certification, and follow the very restrictive green requirements that Google have. They follow their own guidelines which are great for the environment, but kid of difficult to achieve here in Mexico. The result was fantastic though!

Google is an American multinational corporation specializing in Internet-related services and products. These include search, cloud computing, software, and online advertising technologies. Most of its profits are derived from AdWords.

Project gallery

Project location

Address: reforma, mexico city, federal district, mexico.

Materials and Tags

• Sustainability

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INTERVIEW WITH THE STUDIO RESPONSIBLE FOR GOOGLE’S OFFICES DESIGN

20 August, 2015

Evolution Design is the architectural studio responsible for many of the Google’s office designs. Recently, Design Boom had an interview with the executive director Stefan Camenzind and the creative director Tanya Ruegg. They tell designboom how they respond to the changing communal office space, and convey the tech company’s strong culture of open communication and creative collaboration into work environments that foster innovation.

1. What original made you want to study architecture?

Stefan Camenzind: I was always interested in understanding why things are the way they are – therefore it was very often a mystery to me why buildings looked the way they looked. So I think it was first of all my desire to better understand the built environment in which we live, which made me study architecture. Having said that, it still puzzles me today why many buildings look the way they do.

Tanya Ruegg: I have always wanted to create something that will make people feel better, happier, something that will enhance their personality. Designing innovative architectural solutions that are tailor made to suit people’s needs and reflect their values seemed to be the perfect challenge for me.

2. What particular aspects of your background and upbringing have shaped your design principles and philosophies?

SC: People are very much shaped by the values they have been brought up with. In my case these were very much the values of fairness and respect for others opinions, which still drives my design philosophy today.

TR: I grew up in a loving family with great values of respect and understanding. This has given me the necessary stamina, and lots of positive energy, to create for other people. this is why ‘human centered architecture’ is the architecture I believe in.

3. Your firm is responsible for designing several google offices across europe. How did you start collaborating with the technology company?

SC: As often, this happened by chance. We were invited to pitch for the google zurich office and as we had never designed an office interior before we had to think about it from fresh.

TR: Therefore we didn’t suggest to google a design concept but a design process! A process, which would enable the google office to be the best possible workplace for their staff.

4. Were there specific requirements or themes that google wanted you to maintain across each office site?

TR: No. Google is very much aware that their staff is their most valuable asset and therefore we always interact only with the local googler’s to make their office totally unique for them and provide them with the best possible functional requirements they need.

SC: Google has such a strong company culture which is all about open communication and collaboration, creativity and innovation, food and fun. Once you are designing the ‘look & feel’, the offices start having a similar language, which naturally connects them all.

5. Your portfolio also includes the designs of workplaces for other important global brands such as unilever and Hugo Boss. What is the most common client request you receive regarding the spatial scheme of a workplace?

SC: Most clients who come to us want us to help them to develop their workplace strategy for the future. This means we normally don’t have a brief, but develop it together with the client.

TR: For this we do quite a lot of research, for which we have developed specific tools for, desk and meeting room utilization studies, workstyle research, workshops and interviews. This is not only about the functional requirements, but also very much about the vision for the future and the company culture and values. Only based on this we start developing our design concepts.

6. How have you as architects responded to the evolution of the communal office space in your designs?

TR: It is usually the other way round – based on our research we understand what the current and future needs of people are and we create designs, which enable this. Already when we researched our first google office in Zurich we understood clearly that more creative spaces to meet, collaborate and exchange were needed in the future. Accordingly we designed a large number of very different creative spaces to meet, play, drink coffee and exchange ideas.

SC: During the last years the need for this kind of spaces has increased dramatically and in google tel aviv already half of the office floor is dedicated to these kind of creative communication hubs.

7. What are some of the approaches you take to ensure that both individual and group activities can be carried out within the same space?

SC: Whatever you do, always create a sufficient amount of quiet working areas, which enable people to get away from all the hustle and bustle. Being distracted by noise is the biggest problem people face in an open plan office concept.

TR: More importantly this brings us to the question ‘how has work changed’. We can clearly see in all our research the trend that people are less and less at their desk and much more active in different places in and outside the office. Instead on their desk they are in workshops, team meetings, project work, or are collaborating with others. Clearly the standard office, which has mainly desks, cannot be the solution for these changing requirements. Therefore much more creative workplace solutions are required with a multitude of different work settings to support optimally all these new activities as mentioned above.

8. In what ways have technological advancements affected the way you design and complete projects?

SC: Technology is clearly the key! 1. to the way business is changing on a global and local level. 2. to the way the workplace can respond the theses fast changes.

all our projects therefore follow the simple IT principles of < everything everywhere > : – all employees with laptops, soft phones and mobile phones – excellent WiFi bandwidth everywhere – electricity not just on the table and in meeting rooms but also in all informal places – laptop chargers also provided in in all informal and break out areas – screens to connect to in all informal and break out spaces as well – security settings enable working from anywhere outside the office

9. As architects, could you outline your own work habits on a day-to-day basis?

SC: In our office it is very simple – we give our team the IT tools they need and thereafter everybody decide themselves where and how they want to work. I for example are answering these questions while working from abroad and while having numerous whatsapp and skype video calls with the different teams in the office and our clients.

TR: But of course we are normally in the office because we work very much collaboratively. This means we have for each project a large scrum meeting project wall where we plane the daily and weekly activities and deadlines. For example, I switch constantly between focused work on my own to collaborative work with others.

10. In your opinion, what is the future of the workplace?

SC: The future of the workspace is certainly more and faster collaboration and interaction with less and less borders of companies and countries. The future advancements in technology will dictate the speed of the change. All we know today is that we already need to design for the future change.

TR: As the world of business is constantly changing with little certainty, people have a much stronger ‘desire to belong’. This is why it will be even more important in the future that office design creates unique identities, which are reflecting the company culture and values. Thus enabling people to identify and be proud of their workspace and the company they work for.

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You won’t believe work gets done at these three Google offices

By Katherine McLaughlin

Google offices may have slides, climbing walls, nap pods, and basketball courts, but they aren’t adult playgrounds, at least not wholly. “I think that the assumptions are very surface level,” Joshua Bridie, Google’s director of global interior design, tells  AD . Movies like  The Internship and video tours of the tech giant’s workspaces have long offered glimpses into the home bases of Googlers across the globe, prompting common adjectives to surface when discussing the infamous spaces: colourful, playful, animated, or fun. And though these descriptions are true, social media or theatrical adaptations often fail to encapsulate the most essential adjective required to detail the Google offices: intentional. 

“From day one, Google’s founding principles with our products were that they had to be user first,” Michelle Kaufmann, Google’s director of research and development for the built environment, says. “And that’s certainly how we think about our spaces too.” In Google’s 24 years, the company has pushed the office to its limits, operating on a belief that if the people who are working there are happy, healthy, and comfortable, then the company itself will thrive too. It’s in this idea that the jungle-gym-like elements that Google offices are known for become as integral as a desk or a filing cabinet. “They’re there because there is a need for the brain to disconnect and reconnect, so you can refocus your energies in an incredibly productive way,” Bridie says. 

Of course, it’s not just playful and whimsical design that makes a Google office—many factors inform the look and feel of these notable spaces. Below, Kaufmann and Bridie take AD through three of the company’s workspaces to show just what makes a Google office. 

Pier 57 (New York City) 

A 300-foot-long ramp that once transported cargo and buses was converted to provide a multimedia experience to welcome both Googlers and visitors.  

Whether working on a ground-up building or renovating an existing structure, the goal of every Google office is longevity and timelessness. “We think about every office very similarly, which is ‘how can we make a building that is functional and vibrant for hopefully centuries?’” Kaufmann says. Unable to predict the future, the company opts to look to the past for buildings that have achieved this lofty objective. “It turns out there were five main common properties,” Kaufmann explains: high ceilings, double-height space , access to daylight, long span between columns, and exposed structure. It’s largely this design skeleton that defines almost any Google space. 

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Exposed structure is a common element of Google offices.  

A cantilevered room with views of the Hudson River at Pier 57. 

From this core, Google designers look to incorporate three types of spaces: those designed for deep focus work, for collaboration and meetings, and to build community and spark innovation. Many of these core elements of a Google space are on display at the company’s Pier 57 office in New York City: large windows open up to incredible views of the Hudson River, “neighbourhoods” for teams are created within the relatively open floor plan , and numerous cafés and informal meeting spaces make room to decompress or ignite curiosity. 

Bay View (Mountain View, California) 

The central courtyard at Bay View features mariposa-inspired artwork, while skylights along the canopy roof allow plenty of natural light in.  

Designed by Bjarke Ingels Group and Heatherwick Studios, Google’s Bay View campus is the company’s first completed ground-up project. “We had always been in existing buildings, and it’s only really been in the past five to seven years that we’ve actually been designing ground-up buildings for ourselves,” Kaufmann says. With a tent-like ceiling and floor-to-ceiling windows throughout the building, the Bay View campus is easily one of the most unique offerings in the company’s real estate portfolio. However, it also represents Google’s push for sustainability. “We have this crazy, audacious goal of being carbon neutral by 2030 on a 24/7 basis with all of our buildings, including data centres,” Kaufmann explains, adding that Bay View exemplifies many of the strategies the tech company plans to implement to achieve this. 

90,000 silver solar panels make up the canopy roof at Google’s Bay View campus.  

Courtyards connect the collaboration and amenity-focused lower floors with the second-floor focus areas. Here, Googlers gather around the Dinosaur District courtyard and its towering T-Rex sculpture by Marianela Fuentes.

Instead of checking off standard environmentally friendly boxes—like using recycled materials—Google designers look to make their sustainability efforts just as beautiful and exciting for employees as they are for the Earth. “It’s about being sustainable while thinking about how we can create an extraordinary user experience,” Kaufmann explains. At the Bay View building, solar panels on the roof mimic a dragon’s scale in a visually interesting and original way, while a landscaped retention pond acts as an on-site wastewater treatment centre, for example. “Thinking about sustainability from a user-first perspective is our unique approach,” Kaufmann says. 

Also read: This Bengaluru office underlines the power of clean, simple design

Peachtree (Atlanta) 

A custom Google Atlanta sign and peach-shaped arch welcome guests and employees.  

Though the Google offices all have similar backbones, they each have their own flair too. “We want our spaces to be cousins, not identical twins,” Bridie says, adding this is often done by leaning into the design vernacular of the local community. Often, the company partners with local design firms and artists to not only better understand the area, but to truly embed the community in the office. “We’re tying to understand that local community and establish an aesthetic that is truly part of that region versus my interpretation of that region,” he says. In the newest Atlanta office, murals painted by local artists don the walls of a coffee bar, a peach-shaped arch welcomes employees to the office every morning, and upcycled cassettes donated by local Googlers reference the city’s musical history in a creative mural. 

Murals from local artists inspired by various themes in Atlanta’s history decorate this coffee bar and several others at the Peachtree offices.  

A mural made from recycled cassettes donated by Atlanta Googlers. 

Still, despite the purposeful designs, what truly makes each office unique is the people who move in. “Sometimes the spaces that resonate the least with me become the most popular with the Googlers,” Bridie says. “There are some things that might make design professionals uncomfortable, but I celebrate because it truly means that they now feel like they own the space, and that, to me, is success.” 

Also read: This Mumbai office adapts Japandi design to the Indian context

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Corporate Office Design Case Studies - Steelcase

La-z-boy reflects culture in new office.

When you’re almost a hundred years old, being a little dated is to be expected. The 1920’s vintage headquarters of La-Z-Boy, however, didn’t just look out of date, it was holding the company back.

Steelcase Teams with Microsoft to Optimize Surface Hub 2

Relationship brings people, place + technology together to enable workers to collaborate in new ways.

Reinventing La-Z-Boy in New Headquarters

Leadership credits the new work environment with driving important changes at La-Z-Boy: greater employee enthusiasm, more communication and more frequent collaboration.

For many years, architectural firm HDR told clients the workplace of the future should support a mobile workforce. Yet their own office was hardly a model of that vision. Learn how that all changed.

BASF: Redesign For a New Way of Working

BASF, the world’s leading chemical company, recently unveiled a redesigned office for its regional headquarters in Hong Kong, that not

Quarles & Brady: New Innovative Office

A key design feature of this approximately 20,000-square-foot new workplace: It provides for flexibility in a way that also sends a clear message about the Quarles & Brady culture.

Integreon Redesign Drives Innovation

When Integreon planned a new building for Fargo, one that would bring both Fargo offices together under one roof, the initial workplace layout offered rows of workstations in a very traditional approach, hardly what a global, interconnected business needed.

TAQA Redesign: Collaboration meets Privacy

If one word can sum up the strategic intent behind the creation of flagship headquarters for TAQA, the global energy company, it is Majlis—which in Arabic signifies a place where people gather and are welcomed by their hosts.

Creating an Engaging Workplace at Groove

Because most of Groove’s work is collaborative in nature, the majority of the new space is designed for co-creation and brainstorming. Nicknamed “the pit,” this main area is open and collaborative, uniting the team.

Enhancing Company Culture at Orbea

Culture, the reigning champ of hip offices everywhere, promises to fuel employee positivity, productivity and loyalty in small businesses—but do we have proof it actually delivers results? We do now.

Driving Culture Change at Steelcase’s HQ

The company’s leadership decided on a bold plan: reinvent their global headquarters campus in Grand Rapids, MI, leverage the workplace to drive a more mobile, agile and innovative company culture, and use this transformation as a platform for testing new ways of leveraging space to add value to an organization.

Kennedy Space Center Upgrades Seating

NASA tried out the different chairs for a week and, not surprisingly, selected a chair that reflects both ergonomic and design innovation: Siento.

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