Building a 9-story Department Store in Japan from Timber

Brief 

Engineered timber continues to grow in popularity around the world as a sustainable building material. The latest notable work comes from Foster + Partners, which has revealed plans to build a nine-story department store in Japan mostly from timber.

Insight

Following high-profile projects like the Mjøstårnet and Sara Cultural Center, engineered timber continues to grow in popularity around the world as a sustainable building material. The latest notable work comes from Foster + Partners, which has revealed plans to build a nine-story department store in Japan mostly from timber.

The Shibuya Marui Department Store will be located in a prominent spot that’s just a stone’s throw away from Tokyo’s famous Shibuya Crossing.

The project is inspired by traditional Japanese timber building techniques and will make use of modern engineered wood products like glued laminated timber and cross-laminated timber, though Foster + Partners doesn’t actually specify which at this early stage. However, due to Japan’s regular earthquakes, it will also require a little additional reinforcement from steel too, ensuring it can withstand any seismic activity.

In addition, its exterior is designed to maximize daylight inside but mitigate solar heat gain.The department store will be partly powered by on-site solar panels and be topped by a rooftop garden that will host a restaurant and a café and provide choice views of the crossing.

Its interior decor, meanwhile, will take the same approach as most of the other timber projects we’ve reported on and will highlight the natural beauty of the wood, with open plan retail units and timber floors and exposed timber ceilings.