Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

Academic Building Completed at UMass Amherst

  • 12/11/17

The first and largest cross-laminated timber (CLT) academic building in the U.S. has opened at the University of Massachusetts (UMass) Amherst. Designed by Leers Weinzapfel Associates, the multidisciplinary John W. Oliver Design Building brings together 500 students and 50 faculty across four departments into a light-filled 87,000-square-foot space. As a beacon of sustainability, the building features energy-saving elements, such as chilled beams and radiant flooring, and targets LEED Gold certification.

UMASS Amherst Cross Timber Building

Photo: Albert Vecerka / Esto

Cross-laminated timber has long been praised for its durability, lightness, and speed of construction, however, has been slow to catch on in the U.S. relative to Europe and Canada. As the largest installation of wood-concrete composites in North America, the UMass Design Building paves the way in a growing trend of “mass timber” buildings. Cast-in-place concrete and CLT make up the Design Building’s floor slabs, while glue-laminated timber was used for the posts, beams, shear wall cores, and “zipper” trusses.

To reference the colors and patterns of the nearby forests, the four-story building is wrapped in a durable envelope of copper-colored anodized aluminum panels punctuated with vertical windows. The glazing and skylights maximize daylight to the interior to reduce reliance on artificial lighting. Stormwater is managed onsite with bioswales and timber dams that filter and redirect runoff back to the Connecticut River.

“To create a center space of collaboration, a coiling and rising band of studios, faculty offices and classrooms surrounds a skylit commons for gathering and presentations,” write the architects. “The building also forms a green roof terrace, a contemplative space shared by the studios and faculty and a potential experimental space for the landscape department. The slope of the site creates a tall four-story façade on the west facing the mall, and the rising structure invites the community into the building and reveals the activities within.”

Featured

  • Phoenix School District Breaks Ground on New Prep Academy

    The Creighton Elementary School District near Phoenix, Ariz., recently broke ground on a campus replacement for Biltmore Preparatory Academy, according to a news release. The new space will allow the school to expand its enrollment by 50 percent for K–8 students and accommodate modern, collaborative learning styles.

  • Haws Corporation Marks 120th Anniversary

    Haws Corporation, which provides hydration and emergency safety solutions worldwide, recently announced that the company is celebrating its 120th anniversary this year, according to a news release.

  • USC Launches Major AI Initiative After $200M Gift

    The University of Southern California in Los Angeles, Calif., recently announced that it has launched a “transformational” new AI initiative thanks to a $200M gift, according to a news release. The project will leverage AI toward breakthroughs and innovations in subjects like the health sciences, business, security, and the arts.

  • Rethinking K-12 Schools as a Continuous Learning Experience

    Most students move through three or more separate facilities during their K-12 journey, yet the built environments they encounter at each stage have traditionally been designed in isolation, with little continuity in spatial language, learning philosophy, or physical resources. Each new school is a reset with different layouts, learning models, expectations, and ways of moving through a building. The next generation of school design is making the case that the first day of kindergarten and the last day of high school can and should feel connected through common support systems and infrastructure in the physical environment.