After more than 70 years, the Ford Motor Co. finally has an architectural centerpiece.
The automaker’s new global headquarters has officially opened in Dearborn, Michigan, just outside Detroit and within eyeshot of some of the main facilities that have sustained the company for more than a century. Covering 2.1 million square feet and designed by the architecture and design firm Snøhetta, the new building sprawls across four circuitous stories. Getting from one side to another is a trek.
During a two-hour walking tour of the building, a week ahead of its official opening, I traversed at most a quarter of the overall space. This immense size is the building’s strength, as it allows the company to bring much of its executive, engineering, design, and fabrication teams under one (very large) roof for the first time. About 2,000 Ford employees work there now, with around 4,500 expected by 2027.
Jim Dobleske, CEO of Ford Land, the company’s real estate arm, says the headquarters was designed to enable collaboration and a more flexible approach to office work—two post-pandemic prerequisites. More importantly, the building is meant to streamline how different arms of the company work together, using proximity, shared resources, and the simplicity of a single building to break down historic silos.
“It’s not just a building,” Dobleske says, walking through its airy front lobby. “It’s a tool.”
