Gallery: Take the Exclusive Tour of GitHub's New Hacker Heaven
01Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The first thing you see upon arrival at GitHub's brand new San Francisco headquarters is Ryan Tomayko's Macbook Pro. This beat-up old laptop is where Tomayko, one of the company's first engineers, created the "pull request" -- the all-important way of contributing software code (and all sorts of other stuff) to projects housed on the company's web service, a contraption that has redefined the way the world builds things. The Macbook is considered an historic artifact, and it's preserved as a museum piece. You can still see the black duct tape that Tomayko stuck on the left side of the machine to keep it from shocking him, covering a spot where his hands had worn down the machine's metal casing. This hallowed machine is just the beginning of the carefully constructed, strangely beautiful, and wonderfully eclectic creation that is the new GitHub office. You'll find everything from a Steam Punk teepee to a faux railroad track to a recreation of the Oval Office. Like [its old HQ](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/02/github/), the place mirrors the company's mission. GitHub gives people the power to build software -- [and so much more](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/wiredenterprise/?p=63521) --- in a way that seamlessly melds so many different ideas, tastes, and opinions, and the office was pieced together in the same way. In fact, much of it was designed on the GitHub web service. To the right of the mini-museum that houses Tomayko's laptop is the Oval Office, GitHub's reception room, which is a pretty darned good replica of Obama's digs at the White House. Behind GitHub's copy of the Resolute Desk sits Haley Yoder. She is GitHub's brand new concierge, but people call her the president. It's a metaphor for a company that scoffs at hierarchy, appreciates a good joke, and has picked up $100 million in venture capital money. While the company's concierge sits at a presidential desk, co-founder and CEO Tom Preston-Werner occupies an unremarkable workspace three floors up. And in between, there's an assortment of hacking spaces, design rooms, and well-thought-out facilities that can only be described as the ultimate coder's playland. There's a three-person animation studio and a television production crew called "the Eagles." People can work wherever they want -- in Zen-like meditation rooms or dark coder caves on the second floor, or on wooden benches one floor up in the Indoor Park, a sunny spot of faux-greenery that somehow resembles an indoor lawn-bowling green with picnic tables. Built in a 108-year-old former dried fruit storage facility (Rosenberg Bros. & Co.), this is 55,000 square-foot space was first mapped out by a team led by chief information officer Scott Chacon, but soon they uploaded the plans to the company's internal GitHub repository and invited employees to post their comments -- and essentially hack the new building's designs. Last year, a GitHubber named Russell Belfer suggested "a wall of work nooks" where people could "tuck in and hack." That idea eventually became a wall of dark coder caves on the second floor. San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee and friends of the company are dropping by today, for the new building's official ribbon cutting ceremony, but you can take your own tour here.
02Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
GitHub's mascot -- the five-limbed Octocat -- clutches an olive branch and a fistful of forks in this detail from the intricate carpet in the company's Oval Office reception room. The background screen behind the presidential window (below) is programmable, and Hubbernauts are encouraged to add things like helicopters to the background image. 
03Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The negative space created by GitHub's office is now a long and meandering children's area, complete with art supplies, toys, and this Steam Punk teepee setup. It curves and curves, seemingly forever, until you hit the final kiddie play area below. 
04Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
GitHub's Office is more programmable than most. The building uses smart lights built by [Redwood Systems.](http://www.redwoodsystems.com/) They come with temperature and motion sensors, and even though they've only been up and running for only a month, they're already a means of visualizing how the building is being used. The screens above show maps of the three floors of the office, with white thermal radiation spots showing where people are congregating. Another hack uses data from the building's Wi-Fi network shows who's on which floor. 
05Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The ground floor is GitHub's semi-public space, build for hosting large company meetings and public events. "If you're a friend of GitHub, you can work out of here," says Chacon. GitHub's three-story building is built to ultimately host as many as 400 employees, but there's no large-scale company kitchen. Chacon and GitHub CEO Tom Preston-Werner say they'd rather have their employees heading out into the SoMa neighborhood for lunch, supporting local businesses. Beneath the pool table, you can see a faux railroad track that was added as an homage to the building's fruit storage days.
06Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
At GitHub's old offices, the 15,000 square-foot former home of blogging company Six Apart, had a White-House inspired "Situation Room." The company has reprised the idea with their new digs. Below: An Octocat detail from the situation room desk. 
07Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
GitHub's video studio. Home of the Eagles. Because two-thirds of the company's workers are remote, GitHub uses a video team to help everyone stay in touch remotely.
08Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
With a $100 million investment from venture capitalist firm Andreessen Horowitz, GitHub clearly plans to get big. The company has just 70 employees in the Bay Area, but the new building can support 400. Worldwide, there are 210 GitHubbers. Below: GitHubber's used the company's 3-D printer to make these magnet-backed "open signs." Workers are encouraged to move around and work anyplace that feels right, so any monitor with an "Open" sign on it is open for business. 
09Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
Beer 30 is a company tradition. Most Fridays, the company holds this all-hands meeting that's part corporate update, part lecture series, part variety show. In the new offices, there are two meeting places, including the second floor's Scott J. Goldman Amphitheater. Goldman is a GitHub developer who, we understand, really likes the second floor spot. 
10Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The Indoor Park.
11Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The Ladies' Lounge. One of GitHub's many themed rooms. There's also a Rat Pack Room, a Situation Room, a Game Room, a Jam Room, a Party Line Room, the Eagle's Den -- well, you get the idea.
12Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
GitHub uses manually adjustable desks, customized by [Mash Studios](http://www.mashstudios.com/). With a few twists of this wheel, you've got a perfectly adjusted standing desk.
13Photo: Ariel Zambelich/WIRED
The Mod Room.
