Facebook's Gehry Expansion

As reported by the Silicon Valley Business Journal, Facebook submitted plans to Menlo Park for two buildings totaling nearly 1 million square feet plus a 200-room hotel on the 58-acre site it purchased last year. Gehry Partners' preliminary design, seen below in model form, continues some of the language of the just completed MPK 20, as it's being called: The two new buildings would be long rectangular volumes with office space lifted above at-grade parking. Construction of the new offices would happen in two phases, and all three buildings would be linked via bridges. The hotel would be a future phase. The whole plan would involve the demolition of nine buildings currently on the site.

The reveal of Gehry's preliminary design for Facebook's expansion comes when company founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg shared a story on Facebook about working with the architect on MPK 20:
 

I want to share a story as we settle into our new building at Facebook.

When we first announced we were adding a building to our campus, Frank Gehry reached out and asked to design it. He really believes in our mission to connect the world. But even though we all loved his architecture, we initially said no. We figured he would be very expensive and that would send the wrong signal about our culture.

Frank came back to us and said we should go get other bids and that he would beat them all — and he did. As I learned, most building construction wastes a lot of materials and time due to poor planning. Frank has designed special software to assist in his architecture, so he's very efficient.