article.page.titleprefix Space efficiency in timber office buildings
Date
2024-05-14
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Journal of Building Engineering
Abstract
Timber offices indicate a growing field, principally thanks to their potential to offer noteworthy ecological and financial gains over their entire life. Like many other building types, space effi ciency is a crucial design parameter in timber structures to ensure a project’s feasibility. This factor is especially significant in office buildings, where maximizing rental income reflects effective planning. Currently, there is a lack of exhaustive inquiry providing a thorough insight of space efficiency in modern timber office buildings. This study fills this gap in the literature by collecting data from 33 buildings through literature reviews and case study method to investigate space efficiency with the key architectural and structural factors that influence it. The results showed that: (i) central cores stood out as the prevailing core layouts, while peripheral ar rangements were noted as alternative preferences. Prismatic shapes emerged as the most favored options; (ii) timber was extensively used as a primary building material, closely followed by combinations of timber and concrete. Load-bearing systems mainly relied on shear walled frames and configurations; (iii) average space utilization across examined cases was 88 %, with variances ranging from 75 % to 95 % among different instances; (iv) average ratio of core area to GFA was 10 %, showing variations between 4 % and 19 % across various scenarios; and (v) there were no substantial variances noted in the effect of different core planning strategies on spatial efficiency. Similar conclusions were drawn regarding building forms and structural materials. Our paper will assist in crafting design principles customized for diverse stakeholders, including architectural designers of timber offices.
Description
Open Access; Published by Journal of Building Engineering; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jobe.2024.109618 ; Özlem Nur Aslantamer, Department of Interior Architecture and Environmental Design, Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Atılım University, Ankara 06830, Turkey, https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7776-607X; Hüseyin Emre Ilgın, School of Architecture, Faculty of Built Environment, Tampere University, P.O. Box 600, FI-33014 Tampere, Finland, https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8033-7823.
Keywords
Timber, Office, Gross floor area (GFA), Net floor area (NFA), Space efficiency
Citation
https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14411/2034