AUT Tukutuku

Tukutuku is the new home of the Faculty of Health and Environmental Sciences on AUT’s North Shore campus. Essentially two projects in one, we refurbished a four-level building and linked it to a new five-level engineered timber building with a four-storey timber framed atrium. The combination of building reuse and mass timber means that Tukutuku has about half the embodied carbon of an equivalent new development.

The A1 Building is a post-tensioned LVL structure with Potius engineered timber floors sitting on a concrete raft foundation. The lightweight timber frame reduced the amount of concrete required in the foundation, proving to be an economical, low carbon option on poor soils. We lifted the massive timber portal frames into place with a tower crane and two mobile cranes, then secured them with full height four-way brace connections. The vertical sawtooth façade is designed for energy efficiency, reflecting light into the building while minimising overheating.

The comprehensive strengthening and refurbishment of the AF building involved stripping the building right back to its bones and completing a full structural and seismic upgrade. With a new roof, retrofit double glazing, new services and a fresh paint job, the building is transformed.

We had a stream of visitors to site, both admiring the groundbreaking engineered timber structure and our innovative waste diversion setup. We achieved an impressive 90% diversion of waste from landfill and pioneered waste reduction initiatives that have been rolled out throughout the industry.