Park Habitat, designed by Kengo Kuma and Associates, is the new 20-storey building located in downtown San Jose, in the middle of Silicon Valley, California. The building is part of Net Zero Campus, an initiative by the city together with developers Westbank, Urban Community, Peterson and OPTrust that will eventually comprise six buildings.

The mixed-use 1.3 million-square-feet structure will house retail and office spaces, as well as a museum, and will serve as an “expansion space” for the adjacent Tech Interactive, a science and technology centre that offers educational programming.

The biophilic design of the facility features a glass and wood facade covered with vines and planters, a “green-lung” atrium at its core, a roof-garden and vents, which will create “architectural inhalation and exhalation on a 24-hour cycle”.

“Strong relationships to nature are essential to our quality of life,” said Kengo Kuma, “The green lung [of Park Habitat] brings light deep into each floor and surprises as a vertical garden, pervading the building’s atmospheres”.