Archinect - News

Milwaukee developer proposes new record-setting mass timber tower

2024-07-28T08:00:00-04:00

Get ready for another record-breaker, Milwaukee. The city has reentered the race to build the world's tallest mass timber building with a proposal for a new, 50-story tower designed by Michael Green Architecture.

Details of the reportedly $700 million project include a mixed-use design with 750 residential units, 300 hotel rooms, and 190,000 square feet of office space. The 24-person Vancouver-based firm is seen as a leader in mass timber design.

The current record-holder, Ascent MKE tower by Korb + Associates, was on track to lose its title to the forthcoming C6 project from Elenberg Fraser in Perth, Australia, (which is also 50 stories) before the announcement of the new tower (dubbed "The Neutral Project") was made.

Record-setting 50-story mass timber skyscraper approved in Perth

2023-10-05T17:55:00-04:00

Australian architecture firm Elenberg Fraser is moving forward with a new $350 million AUD ($223 million USD) high-rise tower in Perth on the country's west coast that could set the record as the world’s tallest mass timber structure once completed.

Plans for the new 627-foot C6 Tower were approved last week by the city’s Metro Inner-South Joint Development Assessment Panel (JDAP) for client Grange Development.

The firm’s newly-formed research arm Fraser & Partners will be leading the project and says their hybrid steel frame and wood design will utilize a total of 9,678 cubic yards of locally sourced timber in its construction. At 50 stories, it is more than twice the size of the Milwaukee Ascent Tower and another 11 stories taller than SHoP’s forthcoming 39-stroy Atlassian Headquarters in Sydney. Grange says it will be the first carbon-negative construction in the history of Western Australia, though some academics caution this is misleading under current IPCC guidelines.

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Milwaukee's Ascent tower developer on its instant impact and the future of mass timber

2022-10-19T17:24:00-04:00

“We keep amassing this incredible pool of knowledge. It would be crazy to do all of that research and development and not scale it.”

New Land Enterprises (the developers behind Korb + Associates' record-setting Ascent tower design) managing director Tim Gokhman sat down recently to discuss the bellwether project with the Urban Land Institute (ULI). He told Milwaukee native Alby Gallun that the selection of the materials was driven perhaps unsurprisingly by aesthetics and marketing considerations, but that its ability to reduce on-site labor costs and the speed of the construction timeline were also deciding factors along with its proven sustainability and performance metrics.

Gokham said he thinks the burgeoning material can eventually be used up to a height of "30 to 40 stories" and stated that its biggest obstacle (at least for now) is insurance rates driven by the misconstrued risk of fire and water damage. “It is temporary,” he said finally, inferencing the need for further research into its structural capabilities. “The only reason I think why the insurance rates are high is because there aren’t enough data ...

CTBUH certifies Ascent as the world's tallest mass timber hybrid building

2022-08-02T17:47:00-04:00

The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) has officially declared the recently-opened Ascent tower by Korb + Associates Architects the world’s tallest timber-concrete hybrid building.

The 25-story, 86.6-meter (284-foot) structure in Milwaukee takes the distinguished title in two of the mass timber categories: It is both the tallest timber building overall and the tallest concrete-timber hybrid building. The previous world’s tallest timber building was Mjøstårnet in Brumunddal, Norway, certified by CTBUH in 2019, which stood at roughly 280 feet. Previously holding the record of tallest concrete-timber hybrid building was the approximately 276-foot HoHo building in Vienna, Austria.

Previously on Archinect: World's tallest mass timber tower opens in Milwaukee

“Ascent is a very exciting project,” said CTBUH Director of Research and Thought Leadership Daniel Safarik. “It is helping advance the conversation about how we build more sustainable and healthy cities, especially ...

World's tallest mass timber tower opens in Milwaukee

2022-07-14T17:47:00-04:00

A historic milestone in the use of mass timber as a construction material is about to be passed as Korb + Associates Architects’ aptly-named Ascent tower is finally set to open tomorrow, July 15, in Milwaukee.

Standing 25 stories and a total of 86.6 meters (284 feet), the tower is now officially the world record holder for the largest mass timber structure in the world, surpassing Norway’s Mjøsa Tower by a scant 1.2 meters (or roughly 4 feet). It cost $80 million to construct and will provide Milwaukee’s East Town neighborhood with a total of 259 apartment units built in partnership with structural engineers Thornton Tomasetti.

Ascent is now Milwaukee’s second mass timber residential development after the nearby Timber Lofts and will soon be joined by a 15-story design called The Edison, which is set to open next year.

Image courtesy Thornton Tomasetti

2022 has already been an exciting year for the use of the highly sustainable material in architectu...

Milwaukee's wooden skyscraper just got a little bit taller

2019-09-25T18:30:00-04:00

"Having built projects in the U.S. will eventually take away the novelty and reinforce that tall wood buildings are held to the same standards for safety and performance as buildings made from other materials," Parsons told Construction Dive. "This is happening in Europe, where tall wood buildings have been built for many years."

The Milwaukee Plan Commission and the Neighborhoods and Development Committee recently approved changes to New Land Enterprises' Ascent project, a wood tower that is due to be the tallest of its kind in North America, Construction Dive reports

The Korb + Associates-designed tower was initially planned to be 21 stories, but current changes put the tower at 23 stories. Under the tower's current design, it will provide 231 residences and 310 parking spaces.

21-story timber tower—proposed as North America's tallest—wins U.S. government grant

2019-05-16T14:18:00-04:00

A downtown Milwaukee high-rise has found support from an unlikely source: the United States Department of Agriculture. The department’s Forestry Service division announced this week that it had awarded 41 grants totaling $8.9 million to businesses, universities, non-profits and tribal partners in 20 states to “create jobs, support fire-safe communities, restore healthy forest conditions, and spur environmentally sound innovation.”

Part of the grant will be allocated to Ascent, a potentially record-breaking mass timber tower in Milwaukee proposed by New Land Enterprises (previously on Archinect).

Image: Korb + Associates Architects.

"The funds will be used to support engineering work on the proposed 21-story, 201-unit apartment building," reports Jeramey Jannene for Urban Milwaukee. "New Land is partnering with Korb + Associates Architects on the building’s design and New York-based Thornton Tomasetti on the building’s structural engineering."

Meanwhile north of the U.S.-Canada border, another timber tower proposal in Vancouver, the Perkins+Will-designed Canada Earth Tower, promises to rise up to 40 stories and become the "world's next tallest wooden skyscraper."

Proposed 21-story timber tower in Milwaukee would be Western Hemisphere's tallest wood building

2018-10-11T13:34:00-04:00

New Land Enterprises has announced a bold plan to build a 21-story mass timber apartment building in East Town. If completed, the building, known as Ascent, would be the tallest timber structure in the Western Hemisphere according to the company. The news comes just months after New Land released plans to build a seven-story mass timber office building, the city’s first, along the Milwaukee River in Westown.

The timber tower scheme was designed by Milwaukee-based Korb + Associates Architects with structural engineering input from Thornton Tomasetti. If completed as proposed, the 21-story residential building would rise 238 feet—considerably more than the currently tallest timber building in the Americas.

Image: Korb + Associates Architects.