Virginia Tech unveiled detailed plans on Tuesday for the first academic building of its Innovation Campus, coming to National Landing as part of JBG Smith’s broader development of Amazon HQ2. Construction of the campus is slated to begin in 2021 in a mixed-use district of North Potomac Yard, near Alexandria’s border with Arlington.
International architecture firm SmithGroup designed the 300,000-square-foot building with an emphasis on sustainability. When it’s completed in the fall of 2024, it will house offices, instruction and research spaces, and testing labs for graduate programs in computer science and computer engineering. The building’s angular shape, along with solar panels and photovoltaic glass, will capture sunlight to generate power.
Plans for the Innovation Campus were included as part of Virginia’s winning bid to land HQ2. The campus is intended to attract tech talent to National Landing. Ultimately, it will comprise three buildings on about four acres. In addition to graduate-level computer engineering programs, it will also include space for startups.
Marisa M. Kashino joined Washingtonian in 2009 and was a senior editor until 2022.
