‘Lumon Severance‘ tour outie approves! Explore Bell Works– the chilling Lumon Building. Uncover tech history & Hollywood allure in Holmdel, NJ.
If you’re reading this, you probably already know what an “outie” is, but just in case you haven’t seen Severance, which is maybe the best television drama in decades, let us explain. The show’s protagonists have “severed” their ideas, resulting in two distinct selves, an inny for work and an outie for the outside world.
The Travel from New York City takes less than an hour.
The Lumon Serverance, in addition to many other innovations, is the birthplace of cellular telephone communications and a vast amount of laser and fiber-optic technology. However, on Apple TV+, it depicts the corporate headquarters of the fictitious Lumon Industries, the unsettling business at the heart of the corporate dystopia series Severance.
Your Outie enjoys taking on new challenges. Your outie never chooses the center seat. Your Audi evaluates passengers who remove their shoes on an airplane. Furthermore, your outie wants you to see the actual Lumon building, which is closer than you may think if you live in the New York City area.
Our horrifying, neon-lit dreams are all the result of the dark and mysterious Lumon organization, which conducts tests on people in a maze-like facility. If you like the performance, go to New Jersey to see the building for yourself.
You should especially visit the Bell Works facility in Holmdel, New Jersey, which formerly housed Bell Labs, AT&T’s research division.
Stern is not alone. In addition to the usual stream of architectural lovers, Bell Works has recently been swamped with hundreds of Severance visitors, many of whom are writing about it online.
“I’m completely enamored with #severance #lumon #bellworks.” Sophia Stern, the poster, had just shot at Bell Works, the old Bell Laboratories research site in Holmdel, New Jersey, designed by midcentury master architect Eero Saarinen. It was an office park with a rich history.
Bell Works: From Innovation Hub to Hollywood Darling
Bell Work has been used as a set piece. Numerous television shows, including American Horror Story and Emergence, as well as a few films, such as 2023’s Jules, have been shot there.
Severance, a performance about the corporate-office atmosphere, has prioritized structure above everything else.
For those who are unaware, Lumon, the company featured in the episode, implants its employees’ brains, dividing their professional and personal lives and giving them “Innie” and “Outie” personae. Both the Innie and the Outie do not recall what happened inside the structure.
It is presently home to a variety of companies and is known as Bell Works. According to Curbed, the structure was created by architect Eero Saarinen and opened in 1962 as a large midcentury office complex.
Researchers worked on everything from mobile phones to microwaves here until it was abandoned in 2007 and revived by developed Ralph Zucker in 2013, according to Screen Rant. These days, its exterior gardens and lobby are occasionally used as a stand-in for the fictitious Lumon firm.
Zucker told Curbed that Severance is not the first film or television program to be filmed there. It also appears in Emergence and American Horror Story. Fans crowded the amphitheater for other acts as well, but it was nothing compared to the Severance crowd.
Zucker said to curb, “I’ve heard that a lot more people are coming in and taking pictures of themselves in the space.” “Our entire staff works on social media, and they are overloaded.”
According to developer Ralph Zuker, who transformed the old Bell Labs into a new multipurpose facility, the location was popular even before Severance premiered.
Zucker has seen an increase in the number of people visiting and taking self-portraits in the region since Severance’s breakthrough.
Because there is no official tour, visitors may only view the lower-level public areas, such as the large central atrium surrounded by walkways.
Zucker refuses to provide a full tour, and the upper floors are not open to the public. The core structure, which is a triumph of pure geometry, may seem intimidating from a distance.
A large grass field and a finely sketched circular drive surround the main building, which is a flawless, sharp-edged prism of charcoal glass. The public has access to lower levels, which have shopping and dining options.
Despite the workplace catastrophe, Zucker’s company, Inspired by Somerset Development, claims to be 98% leased. Zucker feels the skyscraper is brimming with vitality, but he isn’t worried about it being a symbol of corporate soul-sucking.
Finnish architect Saarinen designed the Holmdel building, which opened in 1962, to house hundreds of scientists in isolation. In addition to providing a pleasant and clean working environment for scientists, the facility was designed to encourage cross-pollination of ideas.
Bell Works: A Real-Life Lumon Building in New Jersey
- Designed by midcentury architect Eero Saarinen, Bell Works was an office park in Holmdel, New Jersey.
- Known for its contributions to cellular telephone communications and laser and fiber-optic technology.
- Used as a set piece in numerous TV shows, films, and ‘Severance’.
- The show appeared in the episodes “Emergence” and “American Horror Story.“
- Abandoned in 2007 and revived by developer Ralph Zucker in 2013.
- Despite its deteriorating state, the building’s architecture was intended to be limitless.
- Currently a popular tourist destination, Bell Works is home to Lumon Industries, a company slicing workers’ brains.
- Bell Labs, a leading research company, employs around 15,000 people and was the first workplace building to include a mirrored glass front.
The structure, now known as Bell Works, has gained fame on social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok and is now a popular tourist destination.
For decades, the building served as a creative hub for Bell Telephone Laboratories, AT&T’s research division, before becoming a monument to corporate America.
The federal government’s antitrust cases against AT&T were resolved in 1982, resulting in the company’s fragmentation and the end of its telecom monopoly. By 2006, Alcatel-Lucent’s Holmdel facility faced demolition.
Following a global uproar from the scientific community, a new developer purchased and refurbished the Black Box in 2013. The quarter-mile-long atrium was transformed into an indoor promenade with stores, a food court, and a library.
Bell Labs has become an unofficial town square, attracting remote workers and tourists who want to share the company’s work and home identities.