High-tech Ford HQ Has a “Crown Jewel: Showroom and Room for 4,000 Employees

Ford Motor Co.’s new headquarters — the carmaker’s first central office switch since Dwight Eisenhower was president — is double the size of its old one, with room for twice as many employees, Mike Householder reported for the Associated Press (AP).

The new structure is being called “Ford World Headquarters.” (Photo: Ford)

The new HQ has seven restaurants as part of a 160,000-square-foot (14,864-square-meter) food hall, office space, design studios, and fabrication shops. And, of course, cars.

The “crown jewel” of Ford’s headquarters, according to Ford Land’s global design and brand director, is a showroom she likened to a “James Bond villain’s lair.”

Ford is moving its HQ for the first time in seven decades, relocating to the newly constructed building 3 miles away in its longtime home of Dearborn, Michigan, the Detroit Free Press also reported.

“But it is impressive. When you’re in it, you feel like you are in the center of automotive design,” Jennifer Kolstad said this past week, after leading a media tour of the new 2.1-million-square-foot (195,096-square-meter) HQ.

“Its principal function is decision-making,” she said. “It’s where we showcase our new product, and our executives make decisions about what we will take to market.”

The new structure is being called “Ford World Headquarters.”

It is part of a larger campus that will take the name of the current HQ: Henry Ford II World Center. Henry Ford II was the grandson of company founder Henry Ford and the uncle of Bill Ford, the automaker’s executive chairman.