Within SETEC TPI in Paris, the team of engineers who now work on projects incorporating structural wood presented themselves as part of the first edition of the SETEC WOOD DAY conferences.
Leader of independent French engineering, SETEC has been the partner of the most complex and prestigious projects for more than fifty years, such as the Millau viaduct. At the time of its creation ten years ago, the association AdivBois turned to SETEC to have virtual models showing three types of possibilities for build high in wood. Logically, SETEC became the contact for the Viguier agency when it came to building the Hyperion residential tower in Bordeaux, a record height with a decisive proportion of structural wood. At the same time, in the public works division, SETEC studied mixed footbridge solutions, in particular with its specialist Valentina Bruno-Huré, who moderated the SETEC WOOD DAY at the Paris headquarters on June 2.
Tower project – in progress – by the WOA agency for REI Habitat with SETEC TPI in Lyon. © SETEC
SETEC WOOD DAY on June 2, 2026 in Paris. © SETEC TPI
French wood engineering is structured
THE department dedicated to wood was only created after the success of Hyperion, from the recruitment of dedicated engineer Didier Sauvage, previously partner of the Graam agency and responsible for Irabois within the Union des Métiers du Bois of the FFB. This was the time when several engineers specifically from the wood industry joined structures previously reserved for general engineering. With Woodeum, Wewood, Elioth (Egis), Terrell and Setec, without forgetting the IBCs, there is now in France a core of high-end wood engineering supported by wood engineers.
Athletes’ Village, lot E, Building E3 with the top floor reserved in principle for basketball, but this magnificent complex, the tallest in wood and perhaps also the most beautiful, has still not found a tenant and the idea of opening the field to the public has remained on the table. © SETEC
The SETEC wood team
SETEC WOOD DAY was imagined this first time as a sort of extension of the International Wood Construction Forum (Parallel Workshop A5, High Wood Projects). The event capitalizes on the skills of the dedicated team, the headquarters auditorium in the heart of Paris, a stone’s throw from Gare de Lyon, and a vision of the international market which allows it to invite speakers such as Sébastien Bildau speaking on the subject of a renovation and raising of a tower in Cape Town in South Africa, and Hiriko Nakatani of Renzo Piano Building Workshop for the ongoing construction of a 100 m tower in Tokyo.
At the same time, the team led by François Lebrun takes stock of the significant projects underway in France, such as two high-rise operations in Lyon with REI Habitat (Audrey Zonco / Jordi Cornudella). Without forgetting to call on Sylvain Desanghère to summarize the situation caused by the decree of February 19 relating to the fire protection of biosourced ERPs.
Cresta Grande Hotel, in Cape Town, a renovation-raising proposal by Sébastien Bildau. © Sebastian Bildau
Tourist Cape Town
Sébastien Bildau, a regular at the Innsbruck Wood Construction Forums and a typical product of high German wood engineering, fascinates with his calculated projects, but on the verge of science fiction, creating unusual architecture where the wooden structure is pushed to its limits. In the case of the Cresta Grande Hotel, in Cape Town, the renovation and raising of a tower of no major interest makes it an architectural and technical object which, if funding is granted, transforms it into a must of the Innsbruck Forum and the discovery circuits of Cape Town. Even more, staying in this heavily green tower will become the highlight of a tourist stay and will operate a bit like the Guggenheim foundation in Bilbao. But perhaps in the meantime, Sébastien Bildau will already follow through on his ideas in Frankfurt, the German city of skyscrapers, where the engineer is planning a all-wood tower.
Marunouchi Tokio Marine, computer-generated image, construction site in progress. © RPBW
Imperial Tower
As for RPBW (Renzo Piano), since the Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural Center in New Caledonia with Mathis 30 years ago – a project which has not aged a bit – the agency’s attention has rather been focused on the development of other materials and systems. A strong return to structural wood in Tokyo with the project for a 100 m tower resting on 42 pillars each made up of four BLC columns forming elements of approximately 2 meters in section, subtly linked by a combination of steel (tensioners) and concrete (strapping).
Currently under construction, the Marunouchi Tokio Marine tower, in the heart of Tokyo and opposite the Imperial Palace, displays modesty and elegance in an environment of towers sometimes twice as high despite seismic risks. It contributes to redeveloping the Japanese local larch wood industry. In a few weeks, the installation of wooden posts will begin to extend a steel base, knowing that the steel will also surround the top floors of the headquarters of this important Japanese insurance company. After a dark year marked by the burning of several thousand-year-old temples, Japan, with RPBW, is trying to reconnect with its illustrious past as a wooden builder.
Jonas Tophoven / © RPBW
