Wall Street Journal baru saja menerbitkan artikel menarik hasil wawancara dengan Chief Design Officer Apple, Jony Ive. Dalam wawancara tersebut, Ive menceritakan bagaimana proses awal mula terlahirnya ide akan Apple Park.

For much of the past decade, a plot of land in Northern California’s suburban sprawl has been the focus of Ive’s imagination. Walking in London’s Hyde Park in 2004, Jobs fantasized with Ive about building a campus centered around a quad, like Stanford University, with plenty of parkland for meandering and meeting, Ive says. At the time, the first iPhone was in the works, and Apple’s revival, thanks to the iPod and iMac, meant the company had outgrown its digs in Cupertino, California, capable of housing 3,000 people in the six buildings that make up Infinite Loop. Apple slowly began plotting for a new space, buying 175 acres of a former Hewlett-Packard site that Ive described as “acres of parking,” one freeway exit south of Apple’s existing headquarters.

In the early days of planning, Ive and Jobs shared “drawings, books, and created expressions of feelings,” says Powell Jobs, who often witnessed the longtime partners collaborating. Some principles were a given, such as the belief that natural light and fresh air make workers happier and more productive.

Satu hal yang menarik dari saya adalah bagaimana Ive memperlakukan proses desain Apple Park sama dengan produk Apple lainnya.

From the beginning, Ive had an “absolute obsession with the idea that it was built like a product, not like a piece of architecture,” says industrial designer Marc Newson, one of Ive’s oldest friends, who has contributed to Apple designs in recent years.

Selain itu, pemilihan bentuk bangunan Apple Park yang seperti cincin raksasa juga bukan tanpa alasan. Seperti yang dijelaskan oleh Ive di WSJ

“One of the advantages of this ring is the repetition of a number of segments,” says Ive. “We could put enormous care and attention to detail into what is essentially a slice that is then repeated. So there’s tremendous pragmatism in the building.” The ring would be made up of pods—units of workspace—built around a central area, like a spoke pointing toward the center of the ring, and a row of customizable seating within each site: 80 pods per floor, 320 in total, but only one to prototype and get right.

Silakan baca artikel lengkapnya di sini.