News
Box Wins Award
The New Zealand Timber Design Awards celebrate outstanding design, engineering and construction practice using timber. The 2009 awards are proudly supported by NZ Wood, Carter Holt Harvey, the New Zealand Timber Design Society and McIntosh Timber Laminates and was held on 27 October at the Langham Hotel, Auckland, hosted by Bill Ralston.
This year the New Zealand Timber Design Awards received a record number of entries. Box Living’s entry for their recently built modular concept home in Muriwai was Highly Commended in the category Residential Architectural Excellence.
This modular home, consists of two off-set timber framed boxes, creating a 3 bedroom house for a young family. The design is reminiscent of the American case study houses of the 40’s and 50’s. The important difference is that BOX have used engineered timber beams in place of steel.
The frames consist of large radiata pine Glulam timber ring beams, supported by laminated timber posts. The engineered timber structure allows spans over 6m in length to create a look and feel traditionally associated with steel frame structures. The engineered timber structure, together with the steel cross braces, provide all the structural support required for the house, allowing great flexibility in how the house is arranged internally. The roof fits cleanly within the depth of the top ring beam, and the floor sits within the depth of the lower ring beam.
The cladding of the house is made from a sandwich panel, the skins of which are made from cement and timber ‘Amroc’ panels. These run behind the posts leaving us with an ‘inside out’ look with the timber house structure being a key feature of the building. The radiata pine engineered beams have been coloured a dark wood stain.
The external decking is eucalyptus saligna and the internal floor is oak.