An Education in Mass Timber

The timing was unique. A code change in New York City that allowed cross-laminated timber (CLT) construction aligned with a renewed focus in the post-pandemic era on the health of building occupants. For WXY, this was an opportunity to navigate different scales of work, with the design of the new building emerging from the facilities masterplan which we had been commissioned to develop ahead of the Garden House project.

The inspiration was the eclectic set of historic and contemporary buildings that make up the Packer campus, which are all clustered around a central garden. That idea of “opening to the garden” was where the Garden House’s arched and vaulted entry, timber screens, and the idea of a “garden wall” came from.

The site with its stone, brick and highly varied Victorian-era buildings set the design inspiration, but the site held the potential for creating a truly accessible garden for all students. That really spurred how the project connected a set of buildings in a new way.

While we were developing the facilities masterplan for Packer we collaborated with the school to perform extensive surveying of students and workshops with faculty. This engagement with the community directly impacted design decisions, including creating separate floors for each grade and making each classroom unique but equal. The support for the health benefits of students of using wood as a visible structure and having visual access to the trees and sky from every classroom came from that engagement and fact-finding.

At WXY, we measure the success of our projects by how they improve everyday life. The Garden House is very much a part of that lineage. While this quality is hard to convey in photographs, we have heard tremendous feedback from the Packer Collegiate community about how the Garden House has eased movement through the school, enhanced student’s connection to nature, and made learning more joyful. Every one of our projects is about movement, light, and functionality coming together to enhance the everyday experience, not just for  the users of the space but for the surrounding neighborhood as well. 

Email interview conducted by John Hill.