The Amazon HQ2 playback showing Helix, which includes workspace, will also be open each month, selected on weekends.
Kindness: NBBJ
Amazon on Tuesday unveiled its latest look at its second headquarters in North Virginia.
The special feature of the design proposal for HQ2 includes a unique structure called “Helix”. Amazon described the 350-meter-high office tower as a “vertical spiral forest,” which features outdoor walkways with trees and plants twisting to the top of the building.
The shape of the building is meant to resemble a double spiral and touches the “innate connection of humanity with nature”, according to the architecture firm NBBJ, which designs the structure.
Amazon has unveiled new renditions of its headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, which include The Helix, a 350-meter-high tower.
Kindness: NBBJ
Helix will serve as an alternative workspace for Amazon employees, but will also be open to the public on certain weekends each month, similar to “Spheres,” the nature-inspired central element of Amazon’s Seattle headquarters.
Amazon said the projects make up the proposed development plans for the second phase of new construction on HQ2. If plans are approved by Arlington County, the company hopes to begin construction of Helix and other on-site office buildings by 2022. Construction is expected to be completed in 2025.
The project plans include three retail pavilions to have space for restaurants, shops, outdoor dining and meeting spaces.
Kindness: NBBJ
Helix, combined with three other on-site office buildings called PenPlace, would create approximately 2.8 million square feet of office space.
In addition to office space, Amazon has set aside more than 2.5 acres of open space that is accessible to the public. There is an amphitheater designed for outdoor concerts, farmers’ markets and other activities, as well as public green spaces.
The campus includes 2.5 acres of open public space.
Kindness: NBBJ
A potential perspective on the retail and restaurant space in the pavilion area.
Kindness: NBBJ
Amazon said the site will also include retail pavilions and restaurants, in addition to other community spaces such as a child care center, a dog run and a food truck area.
Amazon said the site gives priority to “passages, landscaping and retail rather than motor vehicles.” He plans to build protected bike lanes on the streets near the office buildings.
A potential perspective on the retail and restaurant space in the pavilion area.
Kindness: NBBJ
Amazon selected Arlington as the HQ2 site, next to the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens, New York, as part of its well-publicized search for a second location. The company announced in 2019 that it would stop plans to build its new headquarters in New York, after facing the push of local activists and city council leaders.
Last year, Amazon began building two additional 22-story office towers in a development known as Metropolitan Park, south of PenPlace.