New building: timber merchant OLWO Otto Lädrach, Worb

The project
Otto Lädrach AG in Worb, OLWO for short, is one of the most important production and trading companies in the timber industry. The old building no longer met the requirements and space needs. Thus, a dominant four-story wooden building was created in the middle of Worb, which was occupied in spring 2015 after a construction period of about one year. In the spacious showrooms on the first floor, OLWO has plenty of space to present its extensive product range. The two upper floors house the modern offices, the attic floor the in-house cafeteria with roof terrace.

The construction
Due to the small distances between the buildings, individual exterior walls had to be constructed as fire walls and therefore in concrete. These concrete slabs were additionally used for earthquake bracing. Steel was used for beams and columns. The majority of the exterior walls, on the other hand, were made of prefabricated timber elements. OLWO also wanted a wooden solution for the building ceilings. Due to the large spans, a high-performance ceiling system had to be found. Hollow box elements from Lignatur were chosen. Together with the subfloor and an elastically bonded fill, these Lignum elements meet both the required sound and fire protection. For the OLWO building, approximately 470 m³ of solid wood, glued laminated timber and derived timber products were used for the OLWO building. Over 80 percent of the wood used comes from Swiss forests. The building has therefore received an award of the label "Herkunftszeichen Schweizer Holz HSH".

The challenge
In OLWO's new building, wood as a building material was to play as large a role as possible. Apart from the basement, the vertical access core with staircase and elevator is primarily made of exposed concrete.