Apple’s new spaceship headquarters is poised to be one of the most futuristic corporate buildings in California once it touches down, but to help the campus stay connected to its roots, the company is painstakingly preserving a 100-year-old barn built by pioneers who settled the area.
Visitors at Apple Campus 2 will notice the bright red barn sitting next to the new fitness center as part of Apple’s effort to transform the land surrounding the campus from 80 percent asphalt and concrete, to 80 percent greenery and open space.
The Glendenning Barn, named after the pioneer family whose land became a hotbed for tech companies after the decline of local agriculture, was built in 1916 and has seen the rise and fall of Silicon Valley’s biggest companies. Now the structure will be going back to work when Apple Campus 2 opens up in time for the barn’s 100th anniversary.
To preserve the barn during construction, Apple carefully disassembled the structure piece by piece and numbered every single nail, crossbeam and plank. Once the new spaceship campus has landed, the Glendenning Barn will be reassembled and put to use for the first time in decades, storing the company’s sports equipment and landscaping tools need for the thousands of trees on campus.
Former Cupertino Mayor Orrin Mahoney told the San Jose Mercury News that once construction is done, the land “will look much more like it did 50 or 100 years ago than it looked five years ago. The barn fits into that.”
Apple has stockpiled redwood salvaged from an old grove just in case any damaged planks need to be replaced in the future. The land the Glendenning Barn sits on was purchased by HP in the 1970s and the company renovated the barn with a new roof and concrete foundation. The 1,900-square-foot barn was the focal point of social events at the company for a number of years, hosting annual picnics, retiree reunions and beer bashes.
The land was purchased from HP by Apple before Steve Jobs’ death in 2011. The former Apple CEO told the Cupertino City Council that he wanted to plant apricot trees — the same kind enjoyed by the Glendenning family after they settled in the Santa Clara Valley back in 1850.
Source: San Jose Mercury News
