Executives are rethinking the idea of the corporate campus, pondering what percentage should be devoted to office space or whether all employees should be in the same building or spread out among several structures.
Now, Ford Motor Co.'s leadership has revealed how they think a corporate campus should look and feel.
Ford's new global headquarters is still located in Dearborn, Michigan, not far from its previous office. But almost everything else looks different.
Instead of a large white box with a plain grid of windows, the new Ford headquarters uses sweeping glass walls to convey the sense of movement. Two separate sections of the building sprawl across the landscape with each section punctuated by an interior courtyard at the center. The entire structure is surrounded by enough trees and greenery that, from a certain angle, the building appears to emerge from a forest.
Ford started moving into its new headquarters in mid-November. The 2.1-million-square-foot structure, designed by the Norwegian firm Snøhetta and global design and construction firm Arcadis, is about twice as large as Ford's previous headquarters.
Ford's new headquarters structure joins numerous other buildings on a campus that has been refashioned with landscaped walking paths dotted with benches and places to meditate. If an employee needs to walk from one building to the new headquarters office, the path was designed to be a pleasant experience.
And the main office building features space for office workers and for product design teams. Employees with varying types of job duties were purposely placed in close proximity to each other, with the idea that it can lead to collaboration on new product development and other initiatives.
“Supporting Ford’s new hybrid work-from-home model, the Central Campus building will be a resource that gives employees a place to come together and facilitate the easy flow and circulation of ideas,” Snøhetta said in a project description.
While Ford moves into its new building, crosstown rival General Motors is also preparing to occupy a new headquarters. GM plans to move its headquarters to Hudson’s Detroit, under construction in downtown Detroit, and vacate its longtime headquarters at the Renaissance Center complex on the Detroit River.
Ford's new headquarters is a four-story structure comprising several sections of concave glass walls on the exterior, positioned over an expansive covered walkway with ceilings made of red cedar planks. Two segments of the building surround large courtyards accessible to employees.
Other features of Ford’s new headquarters include a 160,000-square-foot food hall, privacy rooms for mothers of newborns and 12 acres of greenspace. About 4,000 employees will be assigned to the new building, but its location at a central spot on the Dearborn corporate campus places about 14,000 Ford employees within a 15-minute walk of the new office. Any employee can access workspace at the new headquarters, with different types of spaces available, including design studios, showrooms and garages.
Showrooms are large, circular rooms with spinning turntables embedded in the floor, allowing new Ford models to be viewed and inspected from any angle.
Ford is plowing tens of billions of dollars into the development of new offices and manufacturing facilities worldwide. In its home state, Ford invested a reported $950 million in the restoration of Michigan Central Station in Detroit, where it houses product research and software development. The renovated Michigan Central Station opened last year.
On the industrial side, Ford is spending more than $11 billion to construct new plants for electric vehicles and batteries in Kentucky and Tennessee, though those projects have been stalled by a slowdown in the EV sector. Ford also recently converted a former World War II U.S. Army depot in Long Beach, California, into a research center for EVs.
Ford’s previous headquarters in Dearborn, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, opened in 1953 and was known as the Glass House for its predominantly glass exterior. It's slated for demolition.
For the record
Snøhetta was design architect and created a new master plan for the corporate campus. Arcadis was architect of record. Barton Malow was the general contractor. Ghafari and Arup provided engineering services.