
WELCOME TO
Tropical Renewable Architecture Design Lab
National University of Singapore

The SkyTimber™: Tropical Renewable Architecture Design Lab is a focal point of advanced designs and interdisciplinary research, thought leadership and education on tropical renewable architecture in the Southeast Asian region and the tropics worldwide. It brings together interdisciplinary groups of architects, researchers, industry partners, regulatory bodies to develop capability to design and build tropical renewable architecture in academic, professional, built environmental sectors - envisioning the symbiosis between sustainable forestry and built environment in the tropics.
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INNOVATIVE DESIGN-RESEARCH
Tropical renewable architecture, namely tropical mass engineered timber (MET) to sink carbon in solid building forms, requires interdisciplinary design and research indispensably. We deliver unique yet functional sustainable architectural aesthetics for human-comfort and sustainable built environment, which is enabled by extensive research across forestry, manufacturing, architectonics, building physics to champion high humidity, weathering and termite attacks in the tropics.


The Tropical Renewable Architecture Design Lab explores unique yet functional sustainable architecture by championing various challenges on tropical renewable architecture, especially in high-density urbanism, aiming to synthesize living comfort, passive microclimate strategy, carbon sink in building forms and symbiosis between greenery and habitation.
Due to year-round sunlight, some plantation species in the tropics may grow a few times faster than those in temperate climate, which may eventually have relatively weak mechanical properties on their own, which most of the current use is limited to furniture, plywood, pulps and chips. However, those fast-growing plantation timber may become suitable for construction use if developed into tropical MET, which may enable massive buildings as effective carbon sink for long-term: a true game changer in the global warming era.
EVENTS
- Fri, 20 Octhttps://cde.nus.edu.sg/arch/news_and_eve
- May 2022NUS Central Library, Singapore
- Thu, 21 MarL4 Barrel Room
- 23rd Nov. 2022Singapore
- Jul. 2024 -Singapore
- 5th Oct. 2022Singapore
- 13th Jan. 2022Singapore
- 7th Feb 2020Singapore
- Thu, 16 MarSingapore
- Thu, 09 MarL5 Forum, SDE4
- Wed, 24 MarNUS Central Library
- Tue, 23 JulSuntec Singapore Convention & Exhibition
- Fri, 02 NovSingapore
- Thu, 01 NovSingapore
- Thu, 06 SeptSingapore
- Tue, 04 SeptSingapore
- Mon, 27 AugSingapore