Ice Block I

Designed using a modern interpretation of construction techniques common to Sacramento in the early 20th century, this mixed-use commercial infill project is one of the first contemporary, timber-framed mid-rise structures in Northern California. The building includes three stories of heavy timber framing over a concrete podium—restaurant and retail space on the ground floor, and offices on the second through fourth floors. Glulam beams and purlins, left exposed to the interior, frame the structure on a 20- by 24-foot grid, with 2 1/2-inch tongue-and-groove Douglas-fir planks between. Inside, designers cantilevered the glulam beams over the glulam columns, creating a custom connection that allows continuous beams resulting in lower bending demand. This allowed for shallower beam depths, giving the office floors a lighter, brighter and more open aesthetic.

See the business case study for this project. The case study series aims to fill a gap in available information related to the financial performance of U.S. properties constructed with mass timber structural systems in buildings across various product sub-types. Using transparent quantitative data, each of the 10 case studies analyzes how mass timber has created value and provides a qualitative overview of successes, challenges, and lessons learned from the developer/owner perspective.