SOM gets on Board with Tall Wood

If you have been following the recent building trends in wood architecture, you may have already asked yourself this question: How tall can we build in wood? As it turns out, the currently most prolific highrise planning firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) is throwing their weight into the discussion. With a recently published report, this firm is […] Read more..

Fire-resistance of Cross-Laminated Timber

  Canadian researchers recently put Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT), a somewhat new building product, to the test to determine fire-resistance properties. Their findings were: The tests demonstrated that CLT assemblies can achieve significant fire resistance that is close to three hours in some cases with even unprotected CLT under full loading conditions. The failure modes were […] Read more..

10-Story CLT Buiding in Melbourne, Australia

Adding to my earlier post about tall building in wood, the articles linked below give some information about the 10-story residential building that is currently going up in Melbourne, Australia. As just reported, this latest addition to the “build high in wood” trend has now received the last wall panels. World’s tallest timber building ‘tops out’ […] Read more..

Unusual structures in Cross-Laminated-Timber (CLT)

As it turns out, Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT), the new and quite promising structural wood product, can not only be used to build apartments or highrises. It can also be used for more unconventional structures. Below are two of them: A Water Reservoir Structurlam, a CLT supplier from Penticton, BC has used CLT to build this water […] Read more..

Multifamily CLT-Building Completed in Quebec

I just received this great assembly video for what Nordic (the manufacturer of the CLT panels) calls the “first multi-family residence in North America built exclusively using CLT panels”. In their own words: Nordic Structures completes the first multi-family residence in North America built exclusively using CLT panels.  Featuring Nordic X=Lam panels, the walls, floors, […] Read more..

Exciting News: New Standard for Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT) Approved by ANSI

A standard has finally been approved for CLT (Cross-Laminated Timber), a new structural wood product that can be used either as a wall or as a slab. From the APA press release: ANSI/APA PRG 320-2011 Standard for Performance-Rated Cross-Laminated Timber, a new standard for cross-laminated timber (CLT), was approved for publication last month by by […] Read more..