NMIT groundbreaking Arts and Media Building is an International showcase

Aug
2

NZ Wood investigates the groundbreaking innovations at the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology.

A SHOWCASE building that breaks new ground in the use of wood as a structural building material in multi-storey construction is already attracting international interest.

The Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology’s (NMIT) Arts and Media Building is being constructed in a pinus radiata laminated veneer lumber (LVL) frame structure using new engineering technology developed by the Structural Timber Innovation Company (STIC).

When completed next year, the building will become the world’s first multi-storey wooden building to use pre-stressed timber as a structural building material.

The building was designed by Nelson-based team of Irving Smith Jack Architects and multi-disciplinary engineers, Aurecon. Their highly original concept for the three-storey building won a national competition for the building’s design run by NMIT and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry in 2008.

The design brief was that the building had to be sustainable and substantially made of wood. Timber is sustainable, renewable, locally available and requires less energy to manufacture than other building materials such as concrete and steel.

Project Director Andrew Irving says in resolving the conceptual design a degree of structural innovation was essential from the outset, requiring close collaboration between architect and engineer.

“We identified three or four options for the design then settled on the combination of simple gravity frames with a more complex shear wall seismic system.” This option was chosen because the sophistication of shear walls “allowed us to use an elegant timber frame with straightforward connections that could readily be adapted for use in a variety of building typologies”.

He says there has been strong interest in the project, both in New Zealand and from as far afield as Chile and India. In August 22-26 this year leading timber engineers from all over the world will descend on Nelson to check out the building’s many innovations.

The tour is part of the programme for the International Council for Research and Innovation in Building and Construction forum hosted by Canterbury University. Originally due to be held in Christchurch, the forum’s venue was changed to Nelson to incorporate the visit.

“As architects, we see this as the first in a new generation of creative, sustainable, wooden structured multi-storied buildings,” Mr Irving says.

STIC CEO Robert Finch says the engineers’ visit will give the building “good international exposure and a chance for them to see what can be achieved with wood as a structural building material”. It is hoped it will encourage the use of wood as a structural building material here and overseas.

Another two projects are already in the pipeline in NZ, he says

The project will also feature as a case study in this year’s NZ Timber Design Society Wood Solutions seminar series commencing on August 31, Mr Irving says.

The building will maximise the warmth and visual appeal of structural timber. To achieve this all structural timber components will remain visible, which will also allow the project’s innovative use of wood to be showcased to both the design and building industries.

The building’s design also breaks new ground for:

Incorporating energy dissipating earthquake‐resistant engineering technology in a structural timber design.
Its sustainable approach to construction making use of timber as a renewable resource, grown and manufactured within a 100km radius of Nelson.
Using locally manufactured LVL by Nelson Pine as the primary structural element and local fabricators Hunter Laminates and Potius flooring to manufacture structural components. At the same time this supports Nelson’s forestry and timber manufacturing industries.
Using Potius floor panels for the first time in a multi-storey timber building.

About Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL)
LVL is an engineered wood composite made from rotary peeled veneers laid up with parallel grain orientation. LVL disperses or removes strength reducing wood defects such as knots and splits. Once this is done the engineered product is considerably stronger and stiffer. The key benefits of LVL are:

It has the same compression strength along the grain as concrete.
It is many times stronger than traditional sawn timber.
It is dimensionally stable and resists warping and twisting.
It is naturally fire-resistant and unlike structural steel can be designed so that it does not require additional fire protection.