Everything You Need to Know About the Apple Campus

Apple is known for having high standards when it comes to design, and it would seem that its latest and biggest project -- its brand new campus -- is no different.
To quote Saturday Night Live’s Stefon, “This place has everything.”
Related: Apple Shows Us It's Hard to Be Innovative When You're on Top. But Does it Really Matter?
There’s a park, giant tunnel, parking garage, cafe, solar panels, an auditorium and of course, an Apple store.
Read on for what Apple’s employees have to look forward to -- including a self-driving shuttle service to get them from point a to point b -- when their new HQ opens.
Apple isn't the first company to set up headquarters on the land.

Steve Job's pitch for the campus was his last public appearance.

In June of 2011, the late Apple co-founder presented the plans for the new campus to the Cupertino City Council. Jobs died just a few months later on Oct. 5, 2011. At the meeting, he explained why the location and the land were so special to him.
“When I was 13, Hewlett and Packard were my idols. I called up Bill Hewlett because he lived in Palo Alto,” Jobs recalled. “I talked to him and asked him if he would give me some spare parts for something I was building called a frequency counter. He did, but in addition to that, he gave me something way more important: He gave me a job that summer.”
There is a major emphasis on health.

Steve Jobs didn’t want it to be like any old office park.

The great outdoors are a priority.

Choose your own adventure.

Visitors are welcome.

There will be a ton of parking.

This could be the new location for all the gadget launches.

On the campus, there will be a 1,000-seat auditorium that will be named the Steve Jobs Theater. It is a 20-foot-high glass cylinder that is 165 feet in diameter and has a metallic carbon-fiber roof. It is going to be situated on a hilltop at one of the highest points of the property with a view of the meadows and the main building. Steve Jobs was known for theatrical product launches, and instead of renting out a space for future events, the company could use the space it has in house.
It is being designed with the same care given to the company’s devices.

For a company as focused on aesthetics as Apple, it’s unsurprising that Apple’s lead designer, Jony Ive, would oversee the design team for the building along with acclaimed British architect Norman Foster. The smallest of details are key, down to the color of the glass panels of the windows and the best angle to set the panes so that streaks wouldn’t be left behind after rain.
For example, an interview with Ive in design publication Wallpaper revealed that the Steve Jobs Auditorium boasts a thoughtfully crafted 80-ton carbon fiber roof tested and built in Dubai and Poltrona Frau designer seats that cost $14,000 -- although whether that is per chair or per row is still somewhat unclear.
You’ll be safe there in an earthquake.

The building is powered by the sun.

Outdoor dining will be available.

The café on the new campus has two giant glass doors that weigh 440,000 each and open and close without sound due to machinery that is hidden underground. The doors can be opened during the warmer months so employees can eat outside.
Who needs to walk outside anyway?

You’ll never know what you’ll find.

The dining options for both employees and visitors at the new campus are being overseen by Francesco Longoni, the company’s head of food service. But it seems that Longoni is an inventor as well. Back in 2010, there was a patent filed for a pizza box designed specially to allow moisture to escape and keep the food from getting soggy. The patent and design were revealed during the course of Wired’s peek behind the curtain at the construction of the new buildings.
The campus set records.

The campus is going to be home to one of the biggest on-site solar energy installations on the planet. It is also going to be the world’s biggest naturally ventilated building, which means that it isn’t going to have to be heated or air conditioned for nine months out of the year. This is in line with the environmentally friendly mission behind the campus -- and the fact that apparently Jobs hated air conditioning.