The tall timber construction boom continues with a new mixed-use residential tower slated for Berlin, Germany. Designed by Oslo's Mad arkitekter, the project will integrate greenery and feature a hybrid wood and concrete structure that will allow it to reach a considerable height of 98 m (321 ft).
WoHo is slated for Berlin's Kreuzberg district and will have 29 floors and a total floorspace of 18,000 sq m (roughly 193,000 sq ft), including adjacent low-rise buildings that are part of the project. Most of the available space will be taken up by residential apartments, with some social housing and some flexible spaces meant to be adaptable to community needs. The lower floors will host bakers, cafés, workshops, daycare, and more. There will also be a publicly accessible rooftop garden on the main tower's uppermost floor that will contain a bar and sauna, plus some additional outdoor terrace areas.
As with other wooden tower projects we've covered, Mad arkitekter's design aims to accentuate the natural beauty of the wood, both on the exterior and interior, with the greenery on the facade helping to enliven it. The interior decor looks simple and pleasant and should be relatively light-filled thanks to generous glazing too.
Structurally, the project will consist of a concrete core and basement, while the columns, beams, floor slabs, and other structural elements will be made from cross-laminated timber. The additional structural stability gained from the concrete helps it reach the 98 m (321 ft) height, which exceeds the current world's tallest all-timber tower, Mjøstårnet, which reaches 85.4 m (240 ft).
WoHo was recently chosen as the winner of an international architecture competition and is currently going through the planning process. Assuming all goes well, Mad arkitekter hopes it will be completed by 2026. According to Bloomberg's CityLab, the budget comes to €90 million (roughly US$110 million).
Tall timber construction is one of the fastest-moving and most exciting areas of architectural innovation at the moment. Some other projects that take a similar approach of combining concrete and timber include the Tree House and Atlassian HQ.
Source: Mad arkitekter