NASA Headquarters

The Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters building at 300 E Street SW in Washington, D.C. houses NASA leadership who provide overall guidance and direction to the US government executive branch agency NASA, under the leadership of the NASA administrator. NASA Headquarters is organized into four Mission Directorates: Aeronautics, Exploration Systems, Science, and Space Operations. Ten field centers and a variety of installations around the country conduct the day-to-day work of the agency.^[3]

Quick Facts Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters, Alternative names ...

Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters
Alternative names	Two Independence Square
General information
Type	Government offices Commercial offices
Location	300 Hidden Figures Way SW Washington, D.C.
Coordinates	38°52′59″N 77°00′59″W
Named for	Mary W. Jackson
Completed	1992
Owner	Hana Asset Management[1]
Technical details
Floor count	9
Floor area	606,000 sq ft (56,300 m2)
Design and construction
Architect(s)	Evans Heintges Architects Kohn Pedersen Fox
Developer	Boston Properties
Other information
Public transit access	Federal Center SW
References
[2]

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The James E. Webb Memorial Auditorium, named for NASA's second administrator James E. Webb, hosts agency news conferences and NASA Social events. A lending library, the history office, archives, production facilities for NASA TV, and a NASA gift shop are also housed in the building.^[4]

The building, which opened in 1992 as Two Independence Square as part of the two-building Independence Square complex which was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox, with George How as the senior designer.^[5] It is currently owned by South Korean investment firm Hana Asset Management and leased to NASA through 2028.^[1]

On June 12, 2019, the street in front of the building was given the honorary name of Hidden Figures Way in honor of some of NASA's black women mathematicians, Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary W. Jackson, who were the central characters in the 2016 film Hidden Figures.^[6] On June 24, 2020, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced that the agency's headquarters building in Washington, D.C., had been renamed to Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters, after NASA's first black woman engineer, Mary W. Jackson.^[7] On February 26, 2021, a ceremony was held officially renaming the building.^[8]

In 2023, NASA opened an exhibit in the lobby, marking the first time it welcomed the public into the building. The Earth Information Center exhibit shows how the agency views Earth from space, tracking patterns in air temperature and quality, climate, water levels, and ecosystems and how that can help humans understand and fight climate change.^[9] The entrance to the exhibit also features a large NASA worm sculpture, which was dedicated in honor of its designers, Bruce Blackburn and Richard Danne, as well as NASA's former art director Robert Schulman.^[10]