The structure is predominantly made from red oak glulam – an engineered material created by finger jointing and laminating multiple grain-aligned layers of timber to enhance strength and stability. This enables the creation of large, structurally robust components suitable for modern construction. Vert also features a decked floor beneath the sails made from thermally modified red oak. The chemical-free heat treatment alters the wood's cellular structure, enhancing its durability and stability and increasing its resistance to decay and insect attacks, which makes it ideally suited to use outdoors in urban spaces such as this.

In consultation with AHEC, Diez Office were able to identify red oak as the optimum material to use for the project, in terms of both structural performance and ecological credentials. Diez Office has been enthusiastic about the aesthetic possibilities and environmental benefits of red oak since learning about the species. Since then, the studio has experimented with the timber, first as a furniture material. 

Despite red oak being sustainable and constituting a sizable 18% of North American hardwood forests, it is underutilised in Europe. Increased use of red oak would reduce the stress on more widely used species and provide designers and customers with an enriched palette of timber materials to choose from.

Due to sustainable forestry practices, the standing timber volume of American forests has more than doubled over the last 50 years – a remarkable reforestation success story. The forests provide critical habitats for wildlife, recreational spaces, and sources of economic growth for local communities. Their trees – and the products made from their timber – play a significant role in combating climate change through carbon sequestration.

AHEC believes that timber and design industries have important contributions to make in the battle against climate change. Vert’s use of red oak demonstrates a valuable material option that gives architects a sustainable solution with great structural properties, while also tackling some of the most immediate impacts of climate change – specifically, rising temperatures and diminishing biodiversity in global cities.