简体中文
EnglishNotable Projects by William McDonough + Partners
Updated
William McDonough + Partners (WM+P) closed in 2025 after more than 40 years of practice, and its website now serves as an archive of the firm's work. The projects below are drawn from that archive. They span academic, corporate, industrial, and institutional clients, and each one illustrates a different piece of the firm's Cradle to Cradle approach — designing for "more good" rather than just "less bad." If you are looking for built examples of circular-economy and green architecture, these are the flagships the firm itself highlighted.
The Project List
| Project | Location | Client / Type | Notable sustainable feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| Universidad EAN | Bogotá, Colombia | New academic building | Designed for exploring the possibilities of the Circular Economy |
| NASA Sustainability Base | Mountain View, California | NASA facility | Energy and water positive — described as NASA's first space station on Earth |
| YouTube Headquarters | San Bruno, California | Corporate office | "A building like a meadow" — designed for flexibility over time |
| Innovation and Research Center | The Netherlands | Research facility | — |
| Solar Orchard Concept | The Netherlands | Energy and food facility | Concept for an energy- and food-positive facility |
| Hero Motocorp Garden Factory | Neemrana, India | Factory for the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer | "Factory like a garden" |
| B/S/H (Bosch Siemens) Headquarters at Park 20 | 20 | The Netherlands | Corporate headquarters |
| Ford Truck Plant | Dearborn, Michigan | Industrial | 10-acre green roof, the largest of its kind, centerpiece of the Rouge's revitalization |
| Apex Plaza | Charlottesville, Virginia | Mixed-use, completed May 2022 | Largest mass timber building on the East Coast; received a 2023 AIA DC Chapter Design Award in the Energy and Resources category |
What the Projects Have in Common
Design for positive impact, not just reduced harm
The NASA Sustainability Base is the clearest example: it is described as energy and water positive, meaning it is designed to produce more energy and handle water better than it consumes. The Solar Orchard Concept applies the same logic to food and energy together.
Buildings that behave like natural systems
The YouTube Headquarters is framed as "a building like a meadow," and the Hero Motocorp factory as a "factory like a garden." In both cases the metaphor signals flexibility over time and integration with living systems rather than a sealed, static box.
Circular economy at the district scale
Park 20|20 in the Netherlands is presented as the world's first circular economy development, with the B/S/H headquarters sited inside it. This shows the firm's approach scaling from a single building to a neighborhood.
Industrial and infrastructure scale
The Ford Truck Plant's 10-acre green roof — the largest of its kind — and its role in the Rouge's revitalization demonstrate that the same principles were applied to heavy industry, not only offices and campuses.
Material choices with measurable recognition
Apex Plaza, completed in May 2022, is the largest mass timber building on the East Coast and received a 2023 AIA DC Chapter Design Award from the Energy and Resources category. It is the most recent project in the archive with an explicit award attached.
How to Use This List
- If you are researching circular economy precedents, start with Park 20|20 / B/S/H and Universidad EAN, which are explicitly framed around circularity.
- If you need energy-positive examples, NASA Sustainability Base and the Solar Orchard Concept are the relevant references.
- If you are interested in green roofs or industrial retrofits, the Ford Truck Plant is the standout case.
- If you want a recent, award-recognized mass timber project, Apex Plaza is the one to look at.
- If you want to follow the firm's thinking beyond the archive, the site notes that William McDonough and his team continue this work through McDonough Innovation.
One caveat: the archive does not publish pricing, timelines, or detailed performance data for these projects, so treat the descriptions above as the firm's own framing rather than independently verified metrics.