But the Facebook building is something different. [...]
For one, it’s more subdued. ... Gehry held back for Facebook. “From the start, Mark wanted a space that was unassuming, matter-of-fact, and cost effective,” Gehry says in statement, referring to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg. “He did not want it overly designed.” [...]
The open floor plan has become a cliche. But Facebook helped set the cliche—and it takes the idea so much further than most.
— wired.com
52 Comments
LOL the hilarity is too much I can't even choose.
So this is where architecture is at....
Gehry + facebook
Piano + apple
Bjark + google
It's like they all met on Match.com
Except for the zig zagging footprint, it looks fairly straightforward.
From the start, Mark wanted a space that was unassuming, matter-of-fact, and cost effective,” Gehry wanted a client that had lots of money and didn't give a shit about people." 1 year later they were married with a curvy building on the way @Match.com
jla-x, these 3 buildings might not be the only important projects happening in Architecture.
and what curvy building?
^ it is pretty straightforward for a FG project. I know these aren't the only things happening...Beiber isn't the only thing happening in music, and Kim Kardashian isn't the only thing happening in whatever the hell she does, which is why their constant presence in the media is so fucking annoying.
Value Engineering by Gehry
I think these are important because they show how tech companies still don't get design and architecture. Even hostile to it (as seen here). Maybe Apple is the only one that gets design, because they "make things" in spite of what FB says it does. Though that may not be true as much anymore.
If only bland color art and an ok roof garden could cover up more bland Silicon Valley Neverland office design. It's like a Gehry building on the High Line, they say, except really a WalMart SV sweatshop next to a highway, with some toys to uplift the code monkeys.
The Gehry quote reads as an apology for working with a client that DNGAF. Um, yeah, the client didn't want it to be "design-y" which is my whole thing, so just read between the LINE$.
Jla-x, If you don't like Gehry's fame, why are you so drawn to it? You're not going to escape the hype by obsessing over it. Go to TMZ or Perez Hilton and look at the comments. Most of them are bashing the celebrities. There is very little difference between an idolizer and a hater. You can avoid the personality-based hype by keeping the focus on the work.
From what I've seen, which is very little, the architecture looks fairly raw/conventional almost banal except for a few flourishes. It almost resembles some white wall art spaces... like some of Gluckman's chelsea galleries or even some of SANAA's work.
There was actually a very good SHoP proposal for Google that went nowhere. It had the right material and dynamic balance, so of course it wasn't built. Then they went for that whole Bjarke Emperor with No Clothes routine. Figures. It's no wonder why SHoP, Holl, and firms like Williams/Tsien are water to SV snake oil.
And nice that FB is taking cred for open floor plan. Ok, if you say so.
Facebook legacy.....AOL knock off 10 years later bit opportune time, best social information collection website ever solely for the purposes of selling you want you want, stocks really aren't worth anything (wait and see) and the worst FOG job in years because they are cheap (remember their stocks aren't really worth anything)....trending down...once fluff buys a piece of architecture a true measure is made......so far Apple still winners!
davvid, im not obsessing over anything. I actually like some of FGs work. the disney concert hall is a really great building and the sound in there is pretty damn good. just find it stupid that companies try to align their corporate identities with certain celebrity architects. Reducing architecture to part of their cheap branding. I dont hate FG or Bjark I hate pretty much all big corporations as any logical person should. If you cant recognize that they are a threat to your planet, freedom, etc then you arent paying attention.
"just find it stupid that companies try to align their corporate identities with certain celebrity architects. Reducing architecture to part of their cheap branding."
Who is actually doing the reducing? Facebook really is a client. Gehry really is an Architect. And there really was an actual building produced. I think that its the media and, frankly, people like you who view their relationship primarily in terms of branding.
You're conflating a political position on corporations with architecture and it makes it very difficult to understand where you are coming from. If corporations invalidate/corrupt architecture, you'd be throwing a huge portion of architecture history out the window.
davvid, what do you need to understand this, a TV ad with Gehry pitching automobiles? Big architecture is branding - the starchitect helps sell the building to investors, financiers, tenants, visitors, etc. For owners it is also simply another expensively fashionable accessory like jewelry.
Clearly the clients here view it as branding, but there is still a building produced. Apart from the gee-whiz of the Wired profile, I don't really mind the building itself--it seems fun enough for a soul-crushing corporate office. It's the rhetoric (the branding perhaps) that cracks me up. The building really has nothing to do with Gehry.... besides a few metallic panels thrown in randomly. The Gehry quote is funny because he clearly is stating as much. The interior shots are bland, and the roof garden seems to be where all the fun is at.
So for a SV recap: FB by Gehry looks more like Bjarke Ingels (cheap looking, kiddy, green-y), Google by Bjarke looks like more like Frei Otto fantasy, and Apple by Foster looks like the iPentagon. I forgot to mention Twitter, which bought into downtown SF.
Perfect reflection of Facebook – erratic….likeness of child client.
I'm sure the clients see this building as a component in a larger strategy for shaping the future of the company.
Design work for an individual or organization is always about solving real problems AND communicating ideas/messages/values out to the world or in toward the people who work or live in a space. All of that could be reduced to "branding" and "image making", if that is how you choose to see the world. Vatican City or Washinton DC's architecture, for example, could be reduced to branding. But that would be a very lazy, simplistic and cynical view of the role of architecture and design.
david, thats a good point...DC and the Vatican are also using architecture as a form of Branding. The Church has since its beginings. Every civilization has had their form of architectural propaganda/pr.
Saying "everything is branding" is the same lame idea that the "design thinkers" in SV is trying to convince the world. Architecture is about particular places.
Dunno what you guys are talking about, this is FOGs best work if you ask me - nice and old skool FOG.
This is pretty great (for a suburban office park). But go ahead and blindly criticize it because it's Gehry. And Facebook.
All true. My point being judge it for what it is, not the hype surrounding it..... Found it funny that Gehry is sheepish about it, while Wired profile declaring it genius. Wait a min... Real architecture buffs know what's what. Kind of part of being an arch nerd is criticizing the so-sos... You know, Creed sucks man, but it's cool if you like them. Also not very Gehryish which is how the project is being framed.... Another Gehry masterpiece! Ok.
"There was actually a very good SHoP proposal for Google that went nowhere. It had the right material and dynamic balance, so of course it wasn't built."
Most tech companies dont give a fuck about right material and dynamic balance. All they want is an infinitely customizable space, and Gehry gave it to them.
After all these years I still don't understand why anyone would use facebook?
Olaf,
Why Are We Still On Facebook
Why you are still on Facebook.
No Miles. Why are 1.3 Billion on Facebook.
Baaaa
Facebook is a great news source. Not the same as archinect but not all that different either.
We just got our first job through a contact via FB messenger which was interesting enough to throw me for a few minutes. Ie there was no email used. It wasn't a banker workaround either just the new reality (for those who don't know, bankers mail are tracked and scanned for language. Try writing a mail that says fuck to your banker friend in NY and see what happens). Job was for a tech company. The world is changing and facebook is part of it for now. Might as well use it.
As far as the architecture goes I like it cuz it is old style gehry. Its been awhile since he did this sort of thing. Prolly cuz clients don't tell him to back off anymore. It's ironic the starchitect haters are pissed that it's not flashy enough.
Davvid I was half joking.....I randomly met my wife on myspace.com when it was like 10 million users....10+ years ago.....Facebook annoyed me because you had to be invited and quite honest after multiple short live reunions wasn't sure why bother staying on a social media website.......funny thing is I missed a high school reunion invite because I wasn't on any social media anymore! Listen the Facebook run is done, it will only dwindle and competition will move people away very lowly. Stagnation is failure in the Internet world. Competition that will start off free and not annoying will attract users and then may lose them once they start needing to find ways to make money.......the cycle is obvious.
And for the record Archinect is the closest social media I use. If I am going to talk to anonymous random strangers it might as well be about something I am interested in. I have contact lists and linkedin if I want to stay in touch.........although Craigslist philosophy form back in the day was fun for testing debates..........to simplify it - Facebook is the white pages and yellow pages with personal customization!!! See Mr Galloway post above.
I'm not really interested in a discussion about Facebook on Archinect, but perhaps there are deeper questions about the new digital regime that Rem addresses in another post here. Overall, I see FB answers embedded in the architecture.... it's kind of the typical digital office pyrotechnics and pizzaz but not much architecture. Take it from an architecture snob.
Interestingly enough, I might get to visit the new building this summer. I'm looking forward to the possibility. #fingerscrossed
Are there better pictures of this place? I'm not sure what that meandering park on the roof is for besides a very creepy walk in nature. It's somehow appropriate for companies that wish you live even more of your life in a fake digital world. I wish all these giant corporations luck in re-purposing these mega-office parks, assuming they won't be overtaken by the next great computer company. They seem a bit isolated and idiosyncratic.
"Indeed, the building blends with the lowlands of Menlo Park, a bit like The High Line dovetails with the very urban landscape in Chelsea and the Manhattan Meatpacking District. "
Sure, without the actual urban fabric of Chelsea and the Meatpacking District. Reminds me of those early internet adds where they'd ask you where you want to go today, as if the computer screen/site was an adequate replacement for actual experience.
Speaking of branding, take a look at this classical behemoth in Russia. Yikes!
http://www.andrewcusack.com/2014/09/30/russias-classical-future/
From pictures I've seen, the office looks like typical SV/Hipster office space--elementary school chic (bad color art), with an open space resembling a high tech sweatshop. Perhaps the flimsy-ness is a self-concious realization that they don't have the staying power of past corporate companies...
In a way it's perfectly authentic to that industry...
Stop it, every single person here would want to work in a building this cool. Especially because most of us work in buildings that look like this;
Does anybody have any street level images?
Like the comment about it resembling a high school….which is ok, that’s what they are about.
Well add a roof garden and some kid paint art and to that image and it's kinda the same..... If you've seen the inside images. But I only speculate.... saying it's better than that office park above is a low bar of relativism. Good forbid any interesting architecture be created anymore.
I think lightperson works for a starchitect
No, Lighthuman, I am saying that all this chirping from the cheap seats, about a building that most of us would likely enjoy working in, is cheap, given most of us work in office parks, with no roof gardens.
lightperson, the conversation is about Facebook actually.
see building.
Facebook can kiss my ass. If I want to feel connected, I walk to the center of town and run into people I know, throw a dinner party, or just play with my kids. If Facebook cared so much about connecting lives, they wouldn't have built this Versailles of office parks. Tailored news feeds, shifting privacy rules, selling your info to sell you more shit. No thanks.
Facebook has been cited as a huge productivity drain costing upwards of $100b a year and has been banned at many businesses.
I use Facebook all the time, I'm a member of my community organization, and local church. I see my friends and family, back east, twice a year. I've learned more about cultural, political and social issues, because of the people in connected to. Far more than I would've if I limited myself to just my immediate friends and family. I've been able to see more artists, been to more gallery openings, purchased more art, because of my Facebook connections. I've been to more local music events,seen more local bands, because of Facebook.
You neo-luddites are the ones limited, not me. I'm connected to a much larger world because of social media.
Ps, we should probably get rid of windows too; I spend endless amounts of my day looking out the window, wondering where the day went.
I don't think you have to be pro or anti-FB to think about how the building manifests certain values. The tweetable exclaimation point (roof-garden! yeah, i like that), cheap-o materials, instagrammable wall art (ohh, so colorful!). It's like a building as a wall-feed (you can tweet that.... ugh). Perhaps similar to the last wave of architecture preening for the camera.
As one of the first members of FB, it's like anything else that gets ruined by greed and scale. Was cool at first, fun to see what your friends from high school are up to, etc. Then when it became a media obsession and cynical advertising privacy industrial complex it was less interesting to me. But in an architectural way, it shows the primacy of physical... your friends are still defined by physical space.... your high school, workplace, etc. Or by a very specific common interest: architecture, french new wave, politics, etc.
There is a yin and yang to Facebook, the yin is all the one word idiocy “comments” and potential liability surrounding it. The yang is the free networking & marketing. If you work for a living I wouldn’t have a page on there or I would tailor it to be super private, which I believe is hard to do….following the yang with an .org type page is smart business these days....even for employees.
Ah, the illusion of connectedness - staring at screen and getting notified every time your third cousin's daughter's boyfriend's mother's cat has a hairball. WooHoo!
isn't archinect forum kind of a social media? why the double standards? oh, i see, this is the self-professed expertise universe and not facebook.
Well, I guess if you had that experience, then I'd quit too. I however have a rather short list of people I consider friends in Facebook, and funny enough I don't get stupid shit. In fact if I did, I don't pay enough attention to care, the benefits outweigh the minor inconvenience.
Who will get to design the new Archinect campus??
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