MacDirectory Magazine

The Apple Park Visitor Center is cut from the mold of Apple Stores worldwide with so much glass it's hard to see how it holds up its oblong, wood-paneled, carbon fiber roof. In the foyer is a huge model of The Spaceship, made of brushed metal, looking something more like a 60's sci fi film than the Spielberg's creation. Just as I began to think that it was an artful but a bit odd representation of the structure that sits a few hundred yards away, I was approached by a guide in an Apple T-shirt who handed me an iPad and invited me on a guided tour via augmented reality. When seen on the iPad's display, the full detail of Apple Park was revealed in all its halo-shaped glory, the model coming to life as I panned, tilted and walked around the table. With a gentle swipe up, I was able to lift the roof and peer inside. With another touch, I could pull out sections of the building and see how the floor plan was laid out. While I was poking around, my tour guide told me a bit about the site. Apple Park, built on the site of HP's main campus, has a foundation that includes 20,000 tons of concrete recycled from the original buildings. The pressing weight of that symbolism, given Jobs and Wozniak's history with that Silicon Valley cornerstone, did not escape me. Some of the 9,000 trees on the campus had originally grown the HP site and were moved and replanted in Watsonville, some thirty miles to the south, and then returned when construction was complete. Among the thirty-seven kinds of fruit trees there are several known to be Jobs favorites. Yes. That includes McIntosh. Lest you too soon forget, up until the time of the revolution spawned by Fairchild Semiconductor, Santa Clara Valley was more commonly known as "The Valley of Heart's Delight", covered by miles of orchards and commercial gardens. The theme of Steve Jobs' design for the site was to "bring back California to Cupertino" with the theme of nature in and out, gentle curves and an expanse of glass that brings the outside in Belying the appearance of fragility, Apple Park was built to be one of the more earthquake resistant structures in the area. It can move four and a half feet in any direction. That's a good thing for any structure that's less than a dozen miles from the San Andreas as well as several other fault lines that are smaller but more rambunctious. The seventeen megawatt solar power grid is among the largest in the world and it gives back energy to Cupertino on the weekends. It's also the world's largest naturally ventilated building. Nine months of the year, it requires no heating or cooling, though given the Mediterranean-style local climate, that's a bit less impressive than it sounds. On the roof of the Visitor Center is a viewing area where you can look across the street at Apple Park and get a hint of what it's really like, though with the trees now growing along the avenue, we're not sure how good the view will be a few summers from now. The lower floors house a showroom for Apple's products, which you're welcome to buy, along with $40 athletic tee-shirts and a few other accessories that you can only obtain by visiting in person. There's a lounge area with a wall of massive displays promoting Apple and its products and an equally massive coffee bar, which at the time I visited, had far more baristas than customers. Over the years I've been away from the Valley, I've made several pilgrimages to the Mother Ship on Infinite Loop. Part of the reason, of course, was to collect swag at its gift shop for me and my friends but a lot of it was for the feeling of being at Apple, surrounded by the people who created and sold the remarkable products that have been part of my life and work for so many years. The energy was palpable. After my visit to Mothership 2, I can't escape the feeling of it being a walled garden, similar to the description many have given to Apple's design philosophy. You can be very impressed, but you can't come too close. 124 MacDirectory FEATURE

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