Continuing Education

When designing a skyscraper, one doesn’t normally think of wood as the primary structural material—but that hasn’t stopped Vancouver, British Columbia–based architect Michael Green from redesigning New York’s famed 102-story Empire State Building as a timber tower. The hypothetical remake of Shreve Lamb & Harmon’s 1931 landmark, the result of a collaboration with another Vancouver-based firm, Equilibrium Consulting, relies almost exclusively on structural elements made of laminated veneer lumber (LVL), a product manufactured from multiple wood plies whose fibers are oriented in one direction.