Announced in June 2022, the Tauranga City Council’s new eight-storey commenced construction in January 2023 and is part of a NZD 304 million Civic Precinct project Te Manawataki o Te Papa.
The centre of New Zealand’s Bay of Plenty is “whole again”, with more than 1,000 council workers set to move into a new 8-storey mass timber building – the country’s largest – in downtown Tauranga later this week. Developed by Willis Bond through its construction arm LT McGuinness, the building uses more than 2,000 cubic metres of cross-laminated timber, glulam and laminated veneer lumber (all supplied locally) – making it about 2,000 tonnes lighter than a conventional steel-braced building.
According to David McGuinness, Wills Bond’s managing director of development, the timber-hybrid building, which also uses steel bracing for seismic and wind protection, is a perfect model for Wellington and Christchurch, which both have a high risk of earthquake activity.
“There is a reason all those villas in Wellington are built out of timber,” he told the NZ Post today, adding that mass timber means buildings in both cities could reach design heights that 10 years ago were unimaginable.
In March 2023, a special ceremony involving Willis Bond, LT McGuinness, Tauranga City Council and representatives from Mana Whenua was held to commemorate ‘breaking dirt’ on the project. (Image Credit: 90 Davenport)
For Wayne Silver, Willis Bond’s managing director of funds and finance, the new tower proves that with careful planning, timber-rich buildings can be both cost-effective and sustainable: “It is significant that Tauranga, one of New Zealand’s fastest growing cities, has led the country in supporting this design approach,” Silver said. “We hope it inspires more regions across New Zealand to embrace mass timber as a smart choice for exceptional workplaces.”
More about the tallest timber building in NZ
Last year, Wood Central reported that the office block was part of a push by Taurunga’s council to shed its reputation as a run-down city by bringing traffic back to the city centre. Recognised as a “6 Green Star building’ – which means world’s best practice, the “incredibly impressive building,” according to Gareth Wallis, the Tauranga’s development and partnerships manager, is designed to mirror the pohutukawa growing on the seaward side: “The lower floors will be grey and brown-toned, moving to green in the middle, with upper floors in red.”
In 2023, Mark McGuiness, Executive Chair of Willis Bond, visited Red Stagg’s production facilities in Rotorua, New Zealand. More than 2000 tonnes of cross-laminated timber, glulam and laminated veneer lumber will be used in New Zealand’s largest all-timber installation – footage courtesy of @TgaCouncil.
According to Mark McGuinness, the executive chair of Wills Bond, the building is “basically a hybrid structure, using mass timber to reduce the carbon footprint of the building by 50% compared to a normal steel building,” made from 135 piles of mass timber—supplied by Red Stag—measuring up to 25 metres in size. It’s cleaner, too – with all parts prefabricated off-site – McGuiness said, revealing that the building site is “much quieter, cleaner and a lot more civilised than a normal building site, where you (typically) have a lot of noise and a lot of crashing.”
- To learn more about the next steps for mass timber in New Zealand and the need to reform building codes to get more timber in mid-rise and high-rise buildings, click here for Wood Central’s article on Nate Helbach, founder and CEO of Neutral—the developer behind Ascent and The Edison—a 31-storey timber-and-concrete skyscraper that broke ground in Milwaukee —visit too New Zealand last month.
Source: Tauranga to Wellington — Lessons from NZ's Biggest Timber Building | Wood Central