Google Pearl Place
CLIENT: Google
Location: Boulder, Colorado
PROJECT SIZE: 200,000 sf
Project Role: Lead Project Designer
It’s a well-known fact that Google prioritizes it’s office space to provide its employees with an environment that supports innovation and knowledge work. The result of such a philosphy is office environments that consistently reside at the leading-edge of interior architecture. At the same time, Google is interested in reflecting the diverse geographies within which it offices its teams resulting in highly individualized offices.
As Google Boulder ramps up to expand it’s presence in Boulder, RNL was selected to create and carry out a design vision for the project that reflected all of these philosophies. As a result, the 4-story space, spread over two connected buildings reflects its Rocky Mountain context through a design language that mimics the variation of ecological zones as one moves up in elevation from the forest to the tundra to snowy peaks. Layered over this metaphorical story is a high-performance office environment that is becoming a case study for future Google work spaces. Google is working with Berkley Labs to conduct occupant health case studies with circadian lighting in the Pearl Place office spaces and rapid protoyping technology is being used to create custom furniture systems.
At a high level, creating a design approach that reflects Google’s whimsical culture while being rooted in rigorous principles of well crafted, thoughtful design that stands the test of time is perhaps the biggest challenge for design in this context.
Design Progress Vignettes
