It?s one of the first instances of cross-laminated timber used for a house For the 2018 Jim Vlock Building Project at the Yale School of Architecture (YSoA)?an annual program that asks first year students to design and build a home for low-income families and individuals?students were challenged to work with cross-laminated timber (CLT), an innovative wood panel product typically used in mid-rise structures as well as increasingly popular tall timber buildings rising around the world.
Earlier this week, students debuted the two-family home they completed on Button Street, in New Haven?s Hill neighborhood. Deborah Berke, dean of the Yale School of Architecture and a previous juror for Curbed?s Groundbreakers Awards said it was probably one of the first examples of CLT being used to build a house of this size. She also told Curbed she?s impressed by the scale of the house, saying it feels much larger than a typical two-family home in the area.
Kay Yang

The two-story house, which comprises a studio apartment and a two-bedroom, will be rented out to formerly homeless families through the housing non-profit Columbus House. This is now the second such project completed in a five-year partnership between YSoA and Columbus House. The inaugural collaboration led to the airy, two-family home completed further north in the same neighborhood last year.
Columbus House will choose tenants for the Button Street house based on a waitlist system, and selected r...