WIA_ISSUE2_2023

BIG PICTURE
1 2
1 A language of planted trellises and
woven hazel facades was used to merge
architecture and natural landscape
into a single, seamless environment
2 CLT was specified for its wider
environmental credentials, aesthetic
potential, light weight, and its speed of
assembly
3 The new box office
Images: Philip Vile
3
assembly. Using CLT allowed for
construction within the six-month
window between theatre seasons.
Aesthetically, a language of planted
trellises and woven hazel facades
was used to merge architecture
and natural landscape into a single,
seamless environment, according to
the architects.
“Using a combination of unfinished
and dark-stained larch for the external
skins, the structures are already
growing back into the landscape
that envelops them,” said Haworth
Tompkins Architects. “Throughout
this long working relationship with
successive artistic directors, the aim
has been to support the growing
theatrical capacity of the organisation
while preserving the magical sense of
entering a secret world at the centre of
the London’s most elegant park.”
A SUSTAINABLE MATERIAL
AND CONSTRUCTION
METHOD
The CLT was manufactured in Austria
by wood products manufacturer Stora
Enso using spruce grown in sustainably
managed forests. The glue-laminated
timber (glulam) was manufactured
by wood products supplier Pabst in a
factory located close to Stora Enso.
All the material used was certified
by the PEFC, and a total of 130m 3 of
solid timber was used in the walls,
floors and roof of the building. According
to PEFC, it takes seven minutes for this
volume of timber to be replenished by the
sustainably managed Austrian forests.
Ninety-five tonnes of CO2 were removed
from the atmosphere when the trees were
growing and will be stored in the structure
over its lifetime.
For the duration of the assembly of the
solid timber structure, a crane was used to
offload and distribute the materials around
the site. CLT and glulam were offloaded
directly from lorries into position. With
fewer deliveries coming to site there is
improved safety at the site access as well
as reduced pollution in the surrounding
roads, further proof of the benefits of this
offsite method of construction.
WOOD IN ARCHITECTURE • ISSUE 2– 2023 19