“We’re taking two materials - steel and concrete - that have high carbon footprints, and replacing them with a low-energy material.” So what’s behind this shift? “The fundamental reason for me is climate change,” said Green. “We’re not trying to throw away concrete and steel – we’re trying to adjust the proportions, and increase the amount of timber” notes Green. Steel beams are used to provide additional strength and flexibility to resist sideways force from the wind, while concrete is used in the foundations and ground floor to provide a stable base for construction. However, not all of the structure is timber.
Wooden skyscraper full#
Illustration: Michael Green Architectureīaobab’s structure consists of a series of these solid timber walls that travel the full height of the tower, along with timber columns and a central timber “core” housing elevators and stairs. Someday I’d like to make a building where all you need is a giant allen key to put it together.”Īrchitect Michael Green believes that increasing use of timber in construction will reduce the carbon footprint of large-scale buildings.
“Because of this, construction will be very quick. “Their manufacture is very accurate, there’s very little work that needs to be done on site,” said Green.
Sheets can then be lifted into place and screwed together like a giant piece of IKEA furniture. The cross-lamination provides the material’s dimensional stability and strength.įor the Baobab project, CLT sheets would be manufactured and cut to exact sizes before being transported to site. This consists of several layers of timber board glued together at 90 degrees to form large structural sheets up to 40cm thick. Green’s Baobab uses Cross Laminated Timber, or CLT. Instead, the designs take advantage of recent innovations in “mass wood” to create vast solid timber panels that can support buildings to a much taller height than ordinary wood can. While the idea of timber towers may conjure up visions of multi-storey Swiss chalets, or high-rise log-cabins, these skyscrapers are not the traditional timber-framed buildings we’re used to seeing. Other 30-storey-plus wooden towers are planned in Stockholm, Vancouver and Vienna. The building would be over three times taller than the world’s current tallest timber building, the ten-storey Forté Apartments in Melbourne, and the UK’s tallest, the nine-story Stadthaus. if the reputation of Japanese engineering is anything to go by, I doubt a wolf would be able to blow this down, let alone the country’s frequent seismic wave activity.These developments are being led by Vancouver architect Michael Green and his proposal for the tallest timber-supported tower in the world – a 35-storey skyscraper that forms part of a six-tower development called Baobab in Paris. If the tale of the three little pigs is anything to go by, I’ll be standing far, far away from this building after it goes up. They chose the opening date of 2041 to celebrate what would be the forestry company’s 350 th anniversary. They were founded in 1691. Of course, this amount of wood raises environmental concerns as well as financial ones, although the Japanese forestry company says that “increased timber demand will promote replanting and contribute to revitalization of forestry and local community through producing seedlings to encourage sustainability of forests.” The predicted cost of the project totals more than $7 billion Canadian. These structures are like a forest, a habitat for living things.”Īll that wood would come at quite the cost, however. Sumitomo believe that wooden buildings like these “create a comfortable environment for both plants and living organisms, providing a pleasant space for the people living there and in the surrounding city. A hybrid of wood and steel will compose the braced tube structure design, which will assist with vibration control. Obviously a building of that height couldn’t feasibly be constructed completely out of wood, but Nikken Sekkei are planning for it to be made from 90 per cent wooden materials.
What differentiates this project from other primarily wooden constructions is the magnitude? This thing is expected to soar 350 metres (or 1,148 feet) into the sky. Sumitomo says their goal is “to create environmentally-friendly and timber-utilizing cities where they become forests through increased use of wooden architecture for high-rise buildings.”
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