SAP Americas Headquarters

A leading developer of business software, SAP Americas aspired to create a high-performance campus for its headquarters in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, that would reflect its standing and values for innovation and technology. A previous master plan for the project's site—a former arboretum replete with a diversity of specimen trees—ignored its most valuable natural assets and called for a new approach. Starting with a program exercise, our team generated an idea of slipping the building into the site in order to allow it to integrate into the sloped site, creating a surrounding landscape of indigenous plants. Constructed in two phases, the multi-part complex curves organically along the grade of the land, minimizing impact on the landscape as well as preserving an existing grove of chestnut trees. The structure's two wings are connected by an atrium, enclosed by a triple-glazed curtain wall system, which serves as the circulation spine and a venue for social and corporate gatherings. Built with utmost attention to its natural site and powered by pioneering renewable systems, the new SAP Americas Headquarters was the first building in the mid-Atlantic region to earn LEED Platinum certification—making it a visible model for best-practice sustainable design at a large scale.