AMBITIOUS HIGHRISE TURNS URBAN TO AMAZON
04 Oct 2017
Triptyque’s ambitious new project will bring the Amazon to the urban jungle of São Paulo with a plant-filled highrise project that will stand as an example of a new sustainable construction paradigm with global implications.
French-Brazilian firm Triptyque has released plans for a mixed-use, all-wood, plant-covered highrise. Located on a 1025-square-meter site in São Paulo, the capital of steel and concrete, the 13-storey building will contain a total of 4700sqm of space dedicated to co-working, co-living, and restaurant dining; the unique plant-based design allowing it to stand out from the crowd.
The building, initiated by Brazilian forest management company AMATA, will be built in cross-laminated timber (CLT), an engineered wood that features layers of timber that are glued together with the grain, alternating at 90-degree angles for each layer. This material harnesses the wood's immense structural properties and is becoming increasingly popular as a sustainable option for highrise buildings.
The building utilises a format that encourages plant growth to allow for a natural ecosystem to develop around the space. The plants cover the building, making it stand out from the urban highrise around it and bringing nature back to a bustling city. The floor will provide access to the terraces, which will support trees, shrubs, flowers and even greenhouses, some of which will be used for vegetable growing.
The stepped silhouette, covered in vegetation and greenery, will blend seamlessly with Vila Madalena’s uneven topography, creating a point of architectural interest. The building is the naturalisation of architecture put into practice, where the metaphor of an urban jungle is used literally, as the combination of wood and vegetation provide a visual and sensorial experience.
The AMATA Building brings an innovative solution to São Paulo because it links a focus on plant life implementation in design with a forestry renewal program. The building will reduce carbon emissions as each 1m³ of reforested wood absorbs one metric ton of atmospheric CO² from the environment. This aims to assist Brazil in meeting the proposal signed at the 21st climate conference in Paris, which promises to replant 12 million hectares of forest and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 43 percent by 2030.
“Wooden-framed buildings are an efficient solution and may serve as a boost towards a change in the environmental consciousness of our societies,” explains Dario Guarita Neto, co-founder and CEO of AMATA. “As we replace non-renewable resources with natural raw materials we also help create a cleaner chain of production and add value to certified forests. This can lower the pressure for deforestation.”
With the extensive plant life and eco-friendly wood, the Triptyque and AMATA highrise will contribute to a cleaner environment and allow for the people of São Paulo to live in tune with a new environmental understanding, acting as a pinnacle representative to the beginning of a new inexhaustible construction paradigm, both in Brazil and worldwide.