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Googleplex Manhattan Changes Work Scene

If you`ve ever imagined a Manhattan workplace, you probably thought of some dreary artificially lit beehive with depressed overworked employees in lush overpriced offices. If that be the case, Google`s new New York offices are defiantly different. The internet giant began moving its 500 employees from their cramped offices in Times Square to a former Port Authority building. The new Manhattan Googleplex, which officially opened Oct. 2, takes up an entire city block, from 15th to 16th st., from Eighth and Ninth Avenue, the largest of Google engineering centers outside the Google headquarters at Mountain View, California.

The Manhattan offices are not easily noticed, there is no sign on the building and one can seldom see a Google employee as the company does all in its powers to keep the employees locked up inside. Not by brute force but by perks and design. The building comes complete with lava lamps, abacuses, and cork coffee tables. The renowned Conde Nast cafeteria was designed by Frank Gehry, and the celebrated Hearst cafeteria was designed by Norman Foster. Employees don`t run out on coffee brake or lunches as they can obtain coffee and food for free at the sushi bar or one of the espresso stations, located within the building`s candy colored walls.

Google employees are encouraged to socialize among themselves. There are groups of Gayglers, Newglers and Bikeglers. Thursday afternoons are dedicated to wine and in an event called Thank God It`s Almost Friday, which replaced the Thank God It`s Friday event, modeled after one in Mountain View, after Googlers, as Google employees call themselves, in New York didn`t want to stick around late on a Friday. These conditions remind some New Yorkers of recent years of the original dot com boom, which has long gone, but now may be returning.