July 17, 2024
Put These Timber Architecture Books on Your Shelf
DESIGNING THE FOREST AND OTHER MASS TIMBER FUTURES
By Lindsey Wikstrom, Routledge (March 2023), 246 pp., $39.95
In this book, architect and Columbia GSAPP professor Lindsey Wikstrom poses the question, What role could mass timber, with its potential to replace concrete and steel, have in ensuring the planet’s survival? Tracing wood’s passage from forest to construction site, the book navigates readers through various aspects of mass timber, from its harvesting to its production, transportation, and disassembly. Along the way, Wikstrom debunks common mass timber myths from carbon sequestration to fire safety. The book serves as a comprehensive, non-extractive guide for architects and engineers who are interested in designing and saving the planet with wood.
INNOVATIONS IN MASS TIMBER: SEQUESTERING CARBON WITH STYLE IN COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS
By Boyce Thompson, Schiffer (May 2024), 224 pp., $45
From the world’s tallest mass timber building in Milwaukee to a fairy-tale experience at the Hans Christian Andersen Museum in Denmark, Innovations in Mass Timber focuses on 16 global projects that represent innovation and style through sustainable mass timber design in the commercial sector. From carbon sequestration to moisture control, acoustics to millwork, Thompson’s book conveys the environmental benefits of mass timber through a rich array of photography, technical diagrams, and prose.
TOUCH WOOD: MATERIAL, ARCHITECTURE, FUTURE
By Carla Ferrer (Editor), Thomas Hildebrand (Editor), Celina Martinez-Cañavate (Editor), Lars Müller Publishers (March 21, 2023), 303 pp., $45
Through an extensive selection of essays, both “practical and visionary” projects, and over 200 illustrations, Touch Wood showcases how architects and designers are harnessing wood’s natural beauty, sustainability, and structural properties to create inspiring spaces. From Swiss timber architecture to Japanese joinery, it highlights wooden architecture’s aesthetic, environmental, and cultural dimensions.
Would you like to comment on this article? Send your thoughts to: [email protected]
Latest
Viewpoints
How Can We Design Buildings to Heal, Not Harm?
Jason McLennan—regenerative design pioneer and chief sustainability officer at Perkins&Will—on creating buildings that restore, replenish, and revive the natural world.
Products
Behind the Fine Art and Science of Glazing
Architects today are thinking beyond the curtain wall, using glass to deliver high energy performance and better comfort in a variety of buildings.
Profiles
Inside Three SoCal Design Workshops Where Craft and Sustainability Meet
With a vertically integrated approach, RAD furniture, Cerno, and Emblem are making design more durable, adaptable, and resource conscious.