Packard Foundation Planning Tours of Green HQ

If you build it, they will come. Boy, will they.

Local interest in the David & Lucile Packard Foundation's new headquarters, a Net-Zero LEED Platinum-certified building, is high. The opening day tours to a small number of people was wait-listed, and still more are querying about seeing the building that the foundation hopes will be a model for sustainable buildings.

“We are so pleased that the community has shown such strong interest in learning more about the Packard Foundation’s new building at 343 Second Street,” said Minna Jung, communications director. 

The foundation is planning to offer more community tours on a periodic basis, "but we are exploring the feasibility of whether we can accommodate the waitlist that developed from the June tours at an earlier point in time."

The Packard Foundation has set up a sign-up list via EventBrite for the fall, to allow staff a chance to move into the building this summer and settle in. 

Those with a particular interest in sustainability have been priming community interest for a long time. GreenTown member Mary Gospe had made a detailed blog post about the features last October from the recycling of the old buildings to the energy savings via "daylighting," triple-paned glass, a chilled-water beam system, and reduced plug loads to rainwater harvesting and storm water management, among many observations. Member Karen Janowski described the opening day tour in a follow-up blog post for GreenTown. 

“Los Altos is a special place for the Packard Foundation—our roots run deep here," Jung said. "We strive to be a good neighbor in Los Altos and want the Foundation’s new home to be a source of pride for the community.”