DJI Sky City, the company’s new headquarters in Shenzhen, China, is now open to employees. Sky City is made up of two towers, 44 and 40 stories tall, designed by the award-winning architectural firm Foster + Partners. This is the same architectural firm that designed Cupertino’s 175-acre Apple Park.
DJI employees were previously dispersed across several Shenzhen buildings due to the company’s rapid growth. The 200-meter-tall sustainable structure, according to DJI founder and CEO Frank Wang, is the physical embodiment of the company’s name, Da-Jiang Innovations, which means “innovation without borders” in Mandarin.
Here’s Wang:
“It took us six years to build the new DJI headquarters, which is the result of the wisdom and determination of DJI and our valued partners. We see Sky City as a product unlike any we’ve ever made: our real home.”
Sky City will be DJI’s premier research and innovation hub. The company’s office, research, and development areas are arranged across the towers in floating volumes cantilevered from central cores by large megatrusses, giving the impression that the buildings are suspended in the air from a distance.
DJI Sky City
DJI Office Space
According to DJI, this is the first time an asymmetrical suspension steel structure has been used in this scale of high-rise tower. The innovative structure eliminates the need for columns, resulting in uninterrupted working spaces that architecturally express “innovation without borders.”
Aerial View
The structure also houses drone flight testing labs over four stories.
Drone test flight space at DJI Sky City.
A 90-meter-long suspension sky bridge connects the towers at 105 metres. According to DJI, the lightweight element represents how all departments within the company work together to achieve a common goal.
Sky Bridge
The ground floor of the building is especially open and welcoming. The lifted volumes draw the surrounding greenery into the base of the buildings via a public sloping podium garden. The ground floor also houses public amenities like a community healthcare centre.
Aerial View of DJI Sky Entrance
In addition, each lobby features a black pine surrounded by a zen garden, set against a striated wall created by the rammed-earth design process. “The result is a harmonious combination of hard-pressed geometry and undulating nature, of tomorrow’s progress and the roots of the past, complementing each other in peace,” DJI says.
DJI Sky Lobby
Elevator Hall
The design of the floorplates maximises daylight to reduce energy consumption, making the building as sustainable as possible. An innovative, “TWIN lift system” reduces the number of shafts needed while increasing usable office floor space. Its intelligent control system also enables it to reduce energy consumption during off-peak hours. Rainwater is collected and stored for reuse, and grey water is recycled for landscape irrigation, which also serves to buffer rains during the monsoon season.
Podium Roof Garden
As Wang puts it:
“At the beginning of a new era for DJI, we pay great attention to the growth and well-being of every employee. This starts with a work environment that is both practical and delightful. I hope that Sky City will inspire all of us to work together and scale new heights of progress, wisdom, and possibilities to develop solutions that benefit society.”
Roof Terrance Garden at DJI Sky City
