Michael Green Architecture Designs a Mass-Timber Research Complex The Oregon Forest Science Complex is a proving ground for mass timber’s sustainable, seismic, and even psychological benefits. The new Peavy Hall is a stout structure composed of two intersecting volumes that partially enclose a new arboretum at its rear. Michael Green Architecture (MGA), which has designed several mass-timber buildings, inserted an amphitheaterlike staircase into the atrium, made of recycled glulam beams from Peavy’s demolished predecessor. It’s topped by a third-story “treehouse.” Courtesy Josh Partee Today a new generation of mass-timber buildings has become the talk of world architecture. Thanks to products like cross-laminated timber, with its increased structural strength, surprising fire resistance, and reduced construction timelines, not to mention wood’s natural ability to sequester carbon, this ancient material has become a 21st-century alternative to concrete and steel. Yet wood’s greatest impact may also be aesthetic and emotional: It’s just cozier.