Willow Village will form part of Facebook's OMA-designed Willow Campus. Image Courtesy of OMA
“Do people love tech companies so much that they would live inside them?” This is the question posed by The New York Times in an article reflecting on Facebook’s plans for Willow Village, a 59-acre urban district located at the company’s Menlo Park headquarters in San Francisco, California.
Having constructed a community of two billion people in the digital world, the social media giant is now committed to building a tangible community in real space. Willow Village will feature 1,500 apartments geared towards Facebook employees, supported by eight acres of parks, plazas, and retail streets.
The ability of Facebook to link communities across the world may be unprecedented, but its plans for a corporation-designed live/work urban environment is not. The New York Times article chronicles both current and historical examples of communities run by and for corporations, from the textile town of Lowell, Massachusetts in 1846 to Google’s Alphabet City.
The full article by The New York Times can be read here.
OMA New York to Design Mixed-Use Menlo Park Campus for Facebook
Facebook has announced plans for a new mixed-use neighborhood adjoining their existing headquarters in Menlo Park, California to be led by the New York office of OMA and Partner Shohei Shigematsu. Known as Willow Campus, the campus masterplan seeks to further invest in Facebook’s home community, joining the original campus designed by Frank Gehry.