It was back in June when we last talked about Apple’s 2nd mothership, or the proposed circular spaceship-like campus that’s currently planned to occupy a 98-acre plot of land purchased from Hewlett Packard (the total campus area includes 175 acres of land). On Wednesday, new revisions surfaced from the City of Cupertino detailing the new campus submissions from Apple, which includes new renderings and details about the structure’s massive size.

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Apple’s Town Hall Auditorium during the Back to the Mac event, October 2010

John Paczkowski at AllThingsD follows-up on his earlier report of Apple’s next media event scheduled for October 4th, claiming that the keynote will be held on Apple Campus in Cupertino, rather than the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, as usual with Apple’s fall event. Details aren’t clear, but it’s possible Apple didn’t want to book a full date for the Yerba Buena Center as the keynote was too much of a “moving target”.

Perhaps, the company felt a more intimate venue was best for newly installed CEO Tim Cook’s first media event. Perhaps YBCA was simply already booked. Whatever the reason, the world will get it’s first look at the next iPhone at Apple’s Town Hall Auditorium in early October.

Apple’s Town Hall Auditorium has been used on several occasions to preview upcoming versions of iOS to the press. Last October, Apple held its “Back to the Mac” media event at Town Hall to preview the new version of OS X, Lion, iLife ’11 and announce updated MacBook Air models.

Rumors surrounding Apple’s next iPhone model have claimed the company has been working on either a completely redesigned device, or a minor update unofficially dubbed “iPhone 4S”. Several sources previously reported the next iPhone would ship in mid-October on AT&T, Verizon and Sprint in the United States; it is widely believed the new device will come with Apple’s upcoming iOS update, iOS 5, pre-installed and ready to be configured with iCloud. AllThingsD also reports Apple’s new CEO, Tim Cook, will preside over the event.

Cupertino City officials will tonight be holding a meeting on Apple’s new ‘spaceship’ campus that was revealed by Steve Jobs himself back in June of this year. It will be the first opportunity that Cupertino residents will be able to raise issues about the project for the City to consider before approval is given for construction. But already, Apple may be planning the construction of a third campus with expected employee growth to be greater than the 13,000 this new ‘spaceship’ campus can hold.

This is according to Cupertino Mayor, Gilbert Wong, who told the Contra Costa Times that Apple Executives have informed him that they are expecting to start working on a third campus at an unknown location after they finish the ‘spaceship’ campus in 2015. Gilbert also notes that within Apple the campuses may just be named as simply as the iPad and iPhone product lines, with this forthcoming ‘spaceship’ campus simply dubbed “Apple 2”.

“I think it makes sense to call it Apple 2,” Mayor Gilbert Wong said Wednesday. “They have iPad 1 and iPad 2; iPhone 1 and iPhone 2. This building is probably going to have much more innovative technologies and products than what they have at” their first campus, also in Cupertino.

You’ll be able to watch tonight’s Cupertino City Council meeting either live in person or online where a broadcast will be streamed.

[Contra Costa Times via The Next Web]

Early last month Steve Jobs unveiled the new “spaceship” campus that Apple hopes to build in Cupertino by 2015. The main reason for it, as Jobs noted in his presentation to the city council, is because “Apple is going through remarkable growth”. That growth has already started so as a result Apple has felt the need to lease out some other buildings in Cupertino for the period between now and when the new campus is complete. A report today in The San Jose Mercury News claims that Apple has struck a deal to lease a big office campus in Cupertino, located near the De Anza College.

The office campus they have leased is the old Measurex campus, which is now known as the Results Way Corporate Center and occupies roughly 373,000 square feet. Based on parking ratios supplied by the City of Cupertino, Mercury News believes up to 1,300 people could work in the new temporary Apple campus.

The campus consists of nine buildings and has been marketed by a commercial brokerage firm. Mercury News got the confirmation that Apple has leased the buildings from Kelly Kline the City of Cupertino’s economic development manager. She said to Mercury News that “this is all good news for the city, Apple is the premier corporation in Cupertino”. Kline also noted that she expected Apple to do some renovation work before they move in to the temporary campus.

[Via Mercury News, Image by MacRumors]

Two days ago, Steve Jobs pitched Apple’s latest project to the Cupertino City Council: a massive, spaceship-like, 4-story new campus that would be located in the 98-acre ex-campus Apple acquired from HP last year. Designed with modern and green technologies in mind and entirely based on curved glass running around the whole structure, the new “mothership” would host 12,000 employees, come with a new auditorium, labs, office, and much more. When Steve Jobs presented the project, answering questions on environmental issues, energy and free Wi-Fi (the City Council asked whether Apple would provide Wi-Fi for everyone outside the campus, like Google does — Steve Jobs simply replied being Cupertino’s top taxpayer would be enough to contribute to the city), it was clear the City Council members were inclined to accept Jobs’ proposal, though no official announcement had been made there.

In a press conference responding to Steve Jobs’ campus proposal, Cupertino Mayor Gilbert Wong stated that “there’s no chance” the City Council is saying no, even if a public hearing will be necessary. However, Wong expressed his appreciation for Apple and Steve Jobs’ visionary attitude, confirming that when they have to deal with a large sales tax producer, they’re usually very accommodating to that company. Apple’s new campus should get done by 2015 if everything goes well.

Video of the press conference after the break. [via TechCrunch]
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Amidst the software announcements at WWDC that finally confirmed the existence of iOS 5 and iCloud, a new build of Lion and the Apple Design Awards, Apple has been busy releasing new software for its platforms and devices. But this week has turned out to be more than just software for the company, as CEO Steve Jobs explained to the Cupertino City Council earlier this week Apple’s plan to build a new campus in Cupertino: a spaceship-shaped, 4-story building to host 12,000 employees and completely revolutionize the way Apple operates in Cupertino. The proposed project is impressive: not only it really looks like a mothership landed on Cupertino, it’s green and eco-friendly in the way it should be built using curved glass thanks to Apple’s retail experience. Not a single piece of glass in the building would be a straight piece — it’s all curved. Parking would be underneath, the number of trees would increase from the current 3,700 to 6,000 with some “apricot orchards” as well — furthermore, it would be located in the 98-acre campus Apple bought from HP last year.

Overall, it’s an impressive project for Apple — and we suspect it may have something to do with a rumor that claimed Norman Foster was collaborating closely with Apple to build a revolutionary campus based on modern, green technologies and renewable energies. Apple would rely on its natural gas facility and use an electricity grid as backup.

As Steve explained to the Cupertino City Council:

It’s a pretty amazing building. It’s a little like a spaceship landed. It’s got this gorgeous courtyard in the middle… It’s a circle. It’s curved all the way around. If you build things, this is not the cheapest way to build something. There is not a straight piece of glass in this building. It’s all curved. We’ve used our experience making retail buildings all over the world now, and we know how to make the biggest pieces of glass in the world for architectural use. And, we want to make the glass specifically for this building here. We can make it curve all the way around the building… It’s pretty cool.

You can check out Steve Jobs’ detailed proposal of the new mothership after the break. [via MacRumors] (more…)

According to a new report by ifoAppleStore, the University of Delaware has confirmed that, as part of new campus construction plans, an Apple Store will be located next to the new Bookstore, Starbucks, and other facilities. The website says the university’s Board of Trustees announced an Apple Store will open inside the new bookstore opening this fall, although it’s not clear whether the “store” will be a full-feature retail location, a “mini store”, an authorized reseller, or something else specifically tailored to students. Indeed, several rumors in the past years suggested Apple was planning campus-specific Apple Stores, but the plans were never finalized.

ifoAppleStore also mentions the University of Delaware extended a contract with Barnes & Noble for 15 years, allowing them to demolish multiple buildings in the campus:

The project will include a new 60,000 square-foot bookstore, a Starbucks and other concessions. At its meeting yesterday, the university’s board said the new B&N bookstore will open August 30th, but didn’t say if the Apple store would open at the same time.

Apple already has a full-size retail store about six miles away from the University of Delaware, and that’s a very trafficked Apple Store considering Delaware has no sales tax. Smaller retail stores on campus would certainly make sense for Apple to showcase products like iPads and MacBook Airs and promote them among students, though we can’t help but think those would also be the perfect way to launch and organize discount programs without forcing students to use the online store, or driving to another Apple Store.

According to El Economista, British architect Norman Foster will be the head of operations to design Apple’s new campus in Cupertino. Sources familiar to the matter told El Economista that the new campus — which happens to be HP’s old campus, recently bought by Apple — is one of the company’s most important projects, and will be “revolutionary” in a way that will be built on top of modern “green technologies” and renewable energy resources. (more…)