Abstract

Timber is an ambiguous material, saturated with implicit values of sustainability, and locality, and at the same time globally ubiquitous. This essay examines the curious moment in Norwegian architectural history when timber, long associated with tradition and craft, became an industrial material of mass-production—in particular, through prefabricated structures produced by the Norwegian company Moelven Brug. By tracing the marketing narratives behind the company’s two main products—large timber housing panels and glued laminated (glulam) beams—this essay reconstructs a complex field of ideas related to building with timber. It argues that, on one hand, Moelven products reflected shifting architectural attitudes towards timber in mid-twentieth-century Norway, treating it as the most “neutral” material, and on the other, they shaped new narratives of “updated tradition” advanced through the use of engineered timber in representative buildings. A curious by-product of a marketing narrative, the myth of updated tradition survives until today, providing a local resolution to the homogeneous global typologies of timber construction.

摘要

木材是一种模棱两可的材料，充满了可持续性和地方性的隐含价值，同时在全球范围内无处不在。这篇文章探讨了挪威建筑史上的奇特时刻，当时与传统和工艺联系在一起的木材成为大规模生产的工业材料——特别是通过挪威公司 Moelven Brug 生产的预制结构。通过追溯该公司两大主要产品——大型木屋面板和胶合层压（胶合）梁——背后的营销叙事，本文重构了与木材建筑相关的复杂思想领域。它认为，一方面，Moelven 产品反映了 20 世纪中叶挪威建筑对木材的态度转变，将其视为最“中性”的材料，另一方面，他们通过在代表性建筑中使用工程木材，塑造了“更新传统”的新叙事。作为营销叙事的一个奇怪的副产品，更新传统的神话一直存在到今天，为木材建筑的同质全球类型提供了本地解决方案。