20 IDEAS THAT WILL SHAPE THE 2020s
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FORTUNE.COM // JANUARY 2020
THE DECOR INSIDE the offices
on Facebook’s campus in
Menlo Park, Calif., can best
be described as “unfinished.”
Steel girders crisscross
overhead. Piping and air
ducts pop out of plywood
walls. Lighting, fire alarms,
and support structures
dangle from the underside
of the floor above—all
exposed to view.
The state of incomple-
tion is not for want of
funds. Despite scandals,
Facebook continues to post
record profits—$6.1 billion
in the most recent quarter.
Rather, the inchoate qual-
ity intentionally reflects
the design philosophy of
Mark Zuckerberg, the com-
pany’s founder and autarch.
Zuckerberg likes to say
that Facebook is only ever
1% finished. So the space
appears under perpetual
construction.
The stripped-down look
feels particularly appro-
priate in Building No. 52.
These are the offices that
incubated Libra, Facebook’s
audacious digital pay-
ments proposal. Here, the
incompleteness creates the
impression that the com-
pany isn’t certain whether
to continue construction
or just close up shop. And
after the brutal reception
that greeted Libra’s rolloutLessons from the
fall and possible
rise of a pioneering
digital currency.