It was a giant information week for Seattle’s Allen Institute for Synthetic Intelligence (Ai2), together with the announcement of a brand new AI robotics initiative and a landmark grant from Nvidia and the Nationwide Science Basis to guide the creation of the longer term AI spine for U.S. scientific analysis.
However the nonprofit analysis institute additionally reached one other milestone in current weeks: transferring into its new 50,000-square-foot headquarters in Seattle’s first large-scale mass-timber business constructing.
The brand new Ai2 house, within the Northlake Commons challenge on the north shore of Lake Union, is now the central gathering and workspace for the group and its group of about 225 folks. Ai2 occupies one flooring of the five-story constructing.
It’s a brief drive up the highway from Ai2’s prior headquarters, and inside strolling or biking distance of the College of Washington, the place a lot of Ai2’s researchers are additionally affiliated with the UW Allen Faculty of Pc Science & Engineering.
Mass timber is an engineered wooden product made by binding layers of wooden collectively into sturdy, massive structural panels and beams, offering the energy of metal or concrete with a decrease carbon footprint. The mass-timber parts are seen all through the house and customary areas of the constructing.
The house contains massive assembly rooms, non-public name rooms, a podcast and video studio, massive doorways that confide in outdoors patios on heat days, and a eating space and gathering house with sweeping views of Lake Union and downtown.
The inside design intentionally avoids a standard “sea of desks” structure in favor of smaller groupings of workstations the place researchers can collaborate whereas remaining related by walkways and sight traces.
There’s even sufficient house for a simulated dwelling surroundings within the Ai2 robotics lab, together with two kitchens, permitting researchers to check their newest AI robotics know-how in circumstances that mimic a real-world family.
Northlake Commons was designed by Seattle-based architect Weber Thompson and constructed by basic contractor Swinerton. Information of the Ai2 lease was introduced in July 2024.
The Allen Institute for AI (Ai2) is separate from the AI2 Incubator, which spun off from the non-profit and has its personal new waterfront dwelling, AI Home, at Pier 70 on Elliott Bay.
Hold scrolling for extra photos from inside the brand new Ai2 house.
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