It has been a big month for Apple. After its latest smartphone, the iPhone 7, debuted to widespread acclaim (thanks in part to the ongoing spectacle surrounding Samsung and the Galaxy Note 7), the tech firm has just announced it will be opening a new British headquarters inside the iconic Battersea Power Station in 2021.
The coal power-generating Battersea Power Station was built in the 1930s and decommissioned in 1983. Despite that, however, it remains one of the most notable locations in all of Britain, garnering the attention of developers who are in the midst of a £9 billion regeneration project to turn the location into a site that includes luxury flats, offices and retail units.
News of the move was first revealed by the Evening Standard, which stated that Apple will combine the eight different offices it has around London, such as the one near its Regent Street Apple Store in central London, and above its Covent Garden store, and consolidate them into a single campus in the Battersea Power Station development where all 1,400 of its employees can work under a single roof.
The workspace itself will consist of the top six floors in the former boiler house, and will be structured around a large, central atrium — effectively making it the largest office tenant at the site, amounting to roughly 500,000 square feet and representing about 40 percent of the office space at the power station site.
"This is a great opportunity to have our entire team working and collaborating in one location, while supporting the renovation of a neighborhood with rich history," Apple said in a statement.
It's important to note, however, that this new site won't necessarily impact Apple's operations in Europe. It has already been pegged as one of Apple's largest sites outside of America, but it still pales in comparison to the firm's primary European HQ in Cork, Ireland, where it employs 6,000 people. And of course, once completed, the UFO-style U.S. HQ - designed to fit 13,000 people within 2.8 million square feet - will dwarf them both.
Apple isn't the only one poised to enter the Battersea Power Station site once it's completed. As mentioned before, the site will house a number of businesses, from Art'otel, a 167-room hotel, to an assortment of restaurants and cafés. There will even be a river bus pier and underground station to connect everyone situated there to the rest of the city.
