WoodFest Cardiff is coming to Wales to celebrate how the country is using wood in design and construction.
Taking place between February and May and featuring a variety of events, WoodFest Cardiff will focus on low carbon housing, connecting communities, local timber and healthy building products. It is organised by the UK timber industry’s campaign, Wood for Good, in collaboration with The Timber Research and Development Association (TRADA), Woodknowledge Wales, Western Timber Trade Association (WTTA) and many more.
As the climate emergency continues to dominate the news agenda, WoodFest Cardiff will demonstrate how building with wood can help. A series of events, seminars, exhibitions and site visits will take place throughout the coming months. WoodFest Cardiff is a learning and knowledge-sharing opportunity for architects, engineers, placemakers, planners, developers, contractors, industry and political professionals.
One of the highlights of WoodFest Cardiff is TRADA’s annual university challenge. Hosted at Cardiff University between 17 and 19 February, 60 students from 30 UK universities will showcase their talent by creating a design concept for a sustainable housing community using timber. The brief is given by Wales & West Housing, with judges from a broad cross-section of disciplines such as engineering, architecture and landscape architecture, including 2019’s Stirling Prize winner, architectural practice, Mikhail Riches.
During the university challenge, Cardiff University will be hosting an evening event dedicated to building performance. The keynote speakers are energy consultants Nick Grant, from Elemental Solutions, and Sally Godber, of WARM, who will share how to achieve Passivhaus standards and their experience of using timber.
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) will host a series of events. Workshops exploring the concept of Active Building will be held in Swansea on 20 February and in Cardiff on 27 February. Sustainable design in historic buildings is the theme for a seminar in Machynlleth on 30 March and an interactive seminar on Inclusive Environments will conclude RIBA’s events in Cardiff on 22 April.
Further events, held by Woodknowledge Wales, include the following:
- Rob Thomas, director and architect at r+m studio in Cardiff, will talk about the exemplar zero carbon build solution developed as part of the Home-Grown Homes Project (HGHP), at the Welsh School of Architecture in February.
- A TRADA event exploring timber construction and manufacturing as part of the HGHP research on better manufacturing homes will take place on 19 March.
- Cardiff Metropolitan University is hosting an invite-only pilot day on measuring building performance on 7 May with Diana Waldron, lead on building performance within HGHP.
- Jane Anderson from the Alliance of Sustainable Building Products (ASBP) will deliver an invite-only workshop on embodied carbon alongside Pentan Architects on 20 May.
Christiane Lellig, Wood for Good campaign director, said:
“WoodFest is proving to be a successful way to bring together the key people involved with design and construction to discuss the benefits of timber or to share their discoveries.
“The built environment is under scrutiny in terms of the environmental impact that buildings have on the planet. WoodFest is an opportunity to learn more about decarbonisation and net zero carbon emissions and how wood can be part of the solution to this global issue.”
Keep up to date with the latest events for WoodFest at www.woodforgood.com