Held at St Fagan's Museum of Welsh Life near Cardiff, Dr Benfield presented his reasoning behind political and industry beliefs that timber frame is the construction method of the future...
The seminar, hosted by the Welsh Timber Forum and "Wood. for Good", focused on educating industry professionals in structural timber frame design, suggesting that if they do not embrace engineered timber frame as the construction method the of the future, then they will find it difficult to survive.
The message was widely popular and accepted by the audience of Welsh architects and industry bodies such as the Forest Stewardship Council, The Forestry Commission and Sustainable Forest Management.
Seminar delegates learnt how cost-effective, energy-efficient and precision-engineered timber frame construction is outperforming brick-and-block construction at almost every level, including structural integrity. The message was emphasised that Welsh architects and builders have been extremely slow on the uptake of timber frame, with only 8.3% of all new build projects in Wales being timber frame (source UK TFA).
"When," Dr Benfield argued, "Wales is compared to other developed countries such as America and Sweden, where timber frame accounts for over 90% of all timber frame, Wales is definitely at the back of queue"?. By comparison over 50% of Scottish and 20% of English new builds are timber frame, with the UK market predicted to grow by around 25% over the next three years (source UKTFA).
Several questions from the floor referred to the lack of strong timber supply chain partners in Wales. John Fletcher from "Wood. for Good.", after offering an overview of the catastrophic effect of the production of construction materials upon the depletion of the ozone layer, suggested that considerable improvement could be made in a single stroke; by building with engineered timber frame.
Other presenters at the seminar included Ivor Davies from Napier University's Centre for Timber Engineering and Peter Chaplowski from the internationally renowned PCKO Architects. All supported the welcoming plea for more precision-engineered timber frame buildings in Wales.
