The stick building

On my way home today I spotted this building. What struck me was the amount of wood. I had to know more so wandered up to the site office and struck up a conversation with a very nice man, Des.

The building structure is all wood. All the workmen onsite are carpenters. It's the first building to be built using this method and it arose from work in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Canterbury.

They developed this method with laminated ply and built a trial building known as "The Stick Building". It did so well in the earthquakes they've taken what they learned and applied it the real world.

This is the result being built here. NZ grows a lot of wood and this is a fantastic use of it. Once completed there will be the ubiquitous glass panels on the outside but inside the wood will remain a feature.

The laminated wood is processed here in NZ too. The wood used here has been processed in Auckland. Amazingly each vertical support beam only has 2 large bolts attaching it to the concrete foundation. You can see steel plates attach each section. It's not hard to see how the materials and construction will flex in a quake.

I think this is the most exciting building I've seen being constructed post-quake. It's the construction method and materials rather than the design.

I'll be interested to track it's progress over the coming months.