Expanding Mass Timber Possibilities in New York Magazine

Is New York City on the cusp of a new era of timber architecture? To imagine how this sustainable material could revolutionize construction in the city, New York Magazine architecture critic Justin Davidson asked SOM to design a building that fully embraces timber's strength, malleability, and expressive personality.

Our conceptual design for a major league soccer stadium, dubbed "The Queens Braid," weaves timber beams into a self-supporting structure that is as eye-catching as it is efficient. For Curbed, Davidson rounded up designs from four firms to showcase the possibilities for mass timber-designs that take advantage of wood's inherent warmth, elegance, and versatility.

For the task, SOM delivered a forward-thinking design, an assembly of lightweight, mass timber elements using techniques that reduce waste and foster future disassembly. According to Davidson, "The result looks at once inevitable and new, the kind of design that prompts a What?! immediately followed by Of course!"