How a Seattle Architect Helped Make Timber Towers Legal in the US
“My hope is that we’re changing the 20th-century paradigm of construction,” says Susan Jones.
Susan Jones, principal architect and founder of atelierjones, in Seattle, on March 16.
Photo illustration: Stephanie Davidson; Photo: Genna Martin/Bloomberg
This article is part of the Bloomberg Green series Timber Town, which looks at the global rise of timber as a low-carbon building material.
When it opens in a few months, a new apartment complex in Seattle will be the first of its kind: specifically, the first building project in the US to break ground under a new category in the construction code, which allows for the structural use of mass timber — a group of engineered, extremely strong wood components— up to a height of 85 feet, or eight or nine stories. (Another new category allows wood structures as tall as 18 stories if certain additional requirements are met.)