Softwood may have been the material of choice for timber architecture up to now, but hardwood has just made a dramatic entrance. 'It is simply the most challenging thing that has ever been built in cross-laminated timber [CLT]… anywhere,' says Andrew Lawrence, an associate director at Arup, about the gravity-defying 34m-long cantilevering curved tube devised by the American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC), London-based architects Alison Brooks and Arup for this year’s London Design Festival.
The Smile, as the project is known, eschews the usual European spruce for a fast-growing tulipwood from North American forests, that has been transformed into 12 huge cross-laminated panels ('the largest hardwood CLT panels ever made', says Lawrence) and is held together by 6,000 long steel screws.
'Almost every architect we talk to says we love CLT but we don’t like the look of it!' says David Venables, European director of AHEC. The organisation has been experimenting with hardwood structures for some years now and believes the material offers the same weight and density as softwood but twice the strength and a far more appealing aesthetic (fewer knots and a classic tight timber grain).
Hardwood may cost more, acknowledges Venables, but you also need to use less of it. 'In the future we will see panels where three of the layers are softwood but the outer layers are tulipwood, for instance,' he says. 'And we will see it used in higher-end buildings where appearance really matters,' adds Lawrence. 'What’s so fun about designing in wood,' he adds, 'is that architects and engineers have to work really closely together and the way a structure is made and engineered becomes part of the architecture.'
Even more exciting is the fact that CLT is carbon neutral, sustainable (the 240 cubic metres of tulipwood used to create this particular ‘flying pavilion’ were replaced in less than five minutes) and, in the words of Alison Brooks, 'connects us back to nature in a way that is not nostalgic or rustic. It’s a material of the future.'
Set outside London's Chelsea College of Art and Design, the sculpture eschews the usual European spruce for a fast-growing tulipwood from North American forests, that has been transformed into 12 huge cross-laminated panels held together by 6,000 long steel screws
'It is simply the most challenging thing that has ever been built in cross-laminated timber [CLT]… anywhere,' says Andrew Lawrence, an associate director at Arup, about the gravity-defying 34m-long cantilevering curved tube
Softwood may have been the material of choice for timber architecture up to now, but 'The Smile' sees hardwood make a dramatic entrance
The AHEC has been experimenting with hardwood structures for some years now and says the opportunities offered by hardwood are the same weight and density but twice the strength and a far more appealing aesthetic than softwood
'What’s so fun about designing in wood,' says Lawrence, 'is that architects and engineers have to work really closely together and the way a structure is made and engineered becomes part of the architecture'
INFORMATION
’The Smile’ is on view until 25 September. For more information, visit the London Design Festival website
ADDRESS
Rootstein Hopkins Parade Ground
Chelsea College of Art and Design
16 John Islip Street
London, SW1P 4JU
-
Artists imbue the domestic with an unsettling unfamiliarity at Hauser & WirthThree artists – Koak, Ding Shilun and Cece Philips – bring an uncanny subversion to the domestic environment in Hauser & Wirth’s London exhibition
-
No guilt, only pleasures await at Singapore’s first all-villa resortFrom late-evening scented baths to midnight snack attacks, daily indulgences come in abundance at the tropical Raffles Sentosa Singapore
-
Lee Broom’s brutalist-inspired ‘Beacon’ will light up London as Big Ben strikes the hourSet to pulse through London Design Festival 2025 (13-22 September) and beyond, the British industrial designer’s sculptural light installation on the South Bank draws on its surroundings
-
15 years of Assemble, the community-driven British architecture collectiveRich in information and visuals, 'Assemble: Building Collective' is a new book celebrating the Turner Prize-winning architecture collective, its community-driven hits and its challenges
-
Meet Studio Knight Stokoe, the landscape architects guided by ‘resilience, regeneration and empathy’Boutique and agile, Studio Knight Stokoe crafts elegant landscapes from its base in the southwest of England – including a revived brutalist garden
-
Tour this compact Kent coast jewel of a cabin with StudiomamaJack Mama and Nina Tolstrup take us on a tour of their latest project – a small but perfectly formed Kent coast cabin in Seasalter, UK
-
Boutique London rental development celebrates European courtyard livingLondon design and development studio Wendover unveils its newest residential project, 20 Newcourt Street, comprising nine apartments; we toured with co-founder Gabriel Chipperfield
-
A refreshed Fulham house balances its history with a series of 21st-century interventionsA Fulham house project by Bureau de Change creates a 21st-century domestic haven through a series of contemporary interventions and a deep connection to the property's historical fabric
-
The Monthly Architecture Edit: Wallpaper’s favourite July housesFrom geometric Japanese cottages to restored modernist masterpieces, these are the best residential projects to have crossed the architecture desk this month
-
Visiting an experimental UK home: welcome to HousesteadThis experimental UK home, Housestead by Sanei + Hopkins, brings together architectural explorations and daily life in these architects’ own home
-
A house in Leamington Spa is a domestic oasis infused with contemporary sensibilitiesThis house in Leamington Spa, by John Pardey Architects, brings together flood risk considerations, a conservation area's historic character, and contemporary sensibilities
