The Apple Campus 2, also dubbed the Spaceship Campus, is all set for a grand opening in April with the official name of Apple Park.
Apple announced the news on Wednesday, Feb. 22, noting that starting in April the new Apple Park will be ready for employees to start moving in. Apple plans to move more than 12,000 of its employees to the new Apple Park, but the move will take more than half a year. At the same time, while the campus will be ready to open in April, some landscaping and smaller building construction will still continue this summer.
Apple Park Steve Jobs Theater
To honor the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who would have turned 62 on Feb. 24, Apple has also decided to name the Apple Park auditorium as the "Steve Jobs Theater." As a reminder, Steve Jobs passed away back in 2011, losing his battle with cancer.
The auditorium will be among the Apple Park buildings set to open later this year and its location seems worthy of the tribute it pays. The Steve Jobs Theater is overlooking the nearby campus meadows and the main Apple Park building, as it's located atop a hill, at one of the highest points on the campus.
"Steve's vision for Apple stretched far beyond his time with us. He intended Apple Park to be the home of innovation for generations to come," says Tim Cook, Apple's current CEO who succeeded Steve Jobs at the helm of the company.
The Steve Jobs Theater will host 1,000 seats and feature an impressive 20-foot-tall glass cylinder entrance, 165 feet in diameter, complementing the equally impressive metallic roof made of carbon fiber.
"Steve was exhilarated, and inspired, by the California landscape, by its light and its expansiveness. It was his favorite setting for thought. Apple Park captures his spirit uncannily well," adds Laurene Powell Jobs, Steve Jobs' widow. "He would have flourished, as the people of Apple surely will, on this luminously designed campus."
Apple Park Will Run Entirely On Renewable Energy
Apple highlights that both the workspaces and the parklands at the Apple Park are designed to benefit the environment, as well as inspire the Apple team. The company takes pride in the Apple Park as one of the world's most energy-efficient buildings, as the campus is designed to run entirely on renewable energy.
The main building alone, often referred to as the Spaceship Building, boasts an impressive 17-megawatt rooftop solar power, which means that the new Apple Park will run one of the world's largest solar power installations when it launches in April.
Apple has also put a great deal of effort into landscaping, replacing 5 million square feet of concrete and asphalt with green fields and more than 9,000 drought-resistant and native trees. Moreover, the Apple Park will also house the largest naturally ventilated building in the world, designed to operate nine months of the year without requiring any air conditioning or heating.
The Apple Park will also feature a visitors' center with a full Apple Store and a café (both open to the public), a large fitness center (open to Apple employees), as well as secure research and development facilities in addition to the Steve Jobs Theater.
