This October MAEBB students visited the Sant Marti Barcelona Library, currently under construction in Barcelona. This library was commissioned by the municipality of Barcelona and is designed by Suma Arquitectura, who won the project in 2015 through a design competition. The Sant Marti library will be the largest fully timber building upon anticipated completion. 

Elena Orte of Suma Arquitectura facilitated the visit and presented the design strategies, construction challenges and unique opportunities that grew out of designing with wood as a building material. Students learned how incorporating structural constraints with wood materials can act as a design agent and drive form and space in an architectural project, as well as the logistics and regulations in structural detailing and construction systems.