When timber met construction

You wait for one bonding session between the timber and construction sectors and three come along in quick succession.

First, last week, we had the two sides convening under one roof at the inaugural Timber Expo show and the Wood Awards presentations – in the case of these events, the roof being that of the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, where the former clocked up 4,000 visitors and 120 exhibitors and the latter an audience of over 200.

Next there’s the latest in the Wood Talks series of seminars at the Building Centre (Store Street, London, October 11, 9am-1pm). It’s called Wood from Beginning to End: Bridging the Supply Chain and will do what it says on the tin, bringing together building professionals and the timber sector, both in the audience and the speaker panel. The presentations and discussion will focus on latest developments in use of timber in construction – notably the projects entered for this year’s Wood Awards - plus obstacles and attitudes that prevent the use of more, including barriers in specification and lack of timber education in universities.

When Michael Cook of Buro Happold became the first non-wood sector chair of TRADA last year he said that a lack of links and communication between construction and timber created “risk gaps”. Many specifiers, contractors and their clients still didn’t understand the material, or what they perceived as its more complex supply chain and how the latter managed risk. So instead they opted for other more familiar materials where they knew they could get “worry-free, technically-assured solutions from a single source”.

The more the two sides come face to face and get to grips with how the other operates, clearly the more trust and understanding will grow and the smaller these risk gaps will become.

Mr Cook’s closing remark in a TTJ interview on his aims at TRADA was as follows: “In three years’ time I want more clients to be saying they specifically want to build in timber and, when you ask anyone in construction whether they see a strong future for wood, for their categoric response to be ‘yes, of course!’”

Hopefully the recent increase in meetings of construction and timber industry minds will help us get to where the TRADA chairman wants us to be.

You can reserve your place at Wood from Beginning to End at www.buildingcentre.co.uk/events