Facebook Opens Garden Rooftop Menlo Park Campus

Facebook has finished work on its new Menlo Park, California campus, designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry.

Most of Gehry’s notable work involves “blend buildings”, the idea of complex shapes fitted in-and-around a central structure. Facebook’s campus is a lot less wacky but fits with the culture of the company: open, productive and green.

The floors inside the campus have almost no walls or doors, with most employees seated at desks alongside all other workers. The few walls put up in the office are glass for office meetings.

This is Facebook’s culture from the start of the social network. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been known for sitting with employees and helping with coding tasks, rather than getting mangled in the business side of the company.

Having this open door approach allows the best engineers to rise to the top and creates a very fast work environment in Facebook, with every employee looking to reach peak performance.

For those that need a little time to process the code, Gehry has created a 457,000 square foot garden on the roof of the building. It offers a wide variety of typical outdoor leisure spots, alongside an amazing view of Silicon Valley.

Facebook is not the only technology company currently moving into a new campus. Apple is building its new HQ to house thousands of engineers and Google is planning a wide range of campuses with a mass of green land.