House of Trees: Wood Design Competition for the XIV World Forestry Congress

Our submission was created for “Treehousing”, an open International Wood Design Competition for the XIV World Forestry Congress held in Durban, South Africa.

The competition called for the design of a wood high-rise, one which suggested solutions to the growing issue of deforestation.

gw architecture inc. submitted a building which used large open glulam frames to support and elevate modular residential and commercial spaces from the street level. The majority of the transitional spaces throughout were open to the environment, eliminating unnecessary material. This liberated the ground, allowing trees to grow below and through the open spaces in the building, creating a vertical forest. The wood consumed in the construction would be equivalent to the amount regrown in the vertical forest. This would provide new materials to be harvested once the building reached the end of its life, completing the sustainable cycle.