TREE FORM at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale
TREE FORM at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale
An MIT–WholeTrees Collaboration on the Future of Sustainable Structures
VENICE, ITALY — On view at the Palazzo Diedo as part of MIT’s Climate Work exhibition for the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale, TREE FORM showcases a groundbreaking collaboration between MIT researchers Caitlin Mueller, PhD, and Sheila Kennedy, FAIA, WholeTrees Structures, and KVA Matx. The installation demonstrates how whole, unmilled trees—specifically irregular forms like forks and branches—can be transformed into high-performance architectural systems through advanced computational design, 3D scanning, and digital fabrication workflows.
As the climate crisis forces a rethinking of construction materials, TREE FORM offers a new model: using the inherent structural intelligence of trees to reduce waste and embodied carbon while creating expressive, efficient structures. The exhibit also debuts the Digital Wild Wood Inventory, a cloud-based repository linking nonstandard tree geometries with architectural applications.
This research-driven installation speaks directly to the 2025 Biennale theme Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective., bridging nature, computation, and sustainable building practice.
TREE FORM is on view at Palazzo Diedo in Venice through November 2025.
Journalists are invited to visit the installation and speak with the collaborators from MIT, WholeTrees, and KVA Matx. Interview opportunities and additional materials are available upon request.
About MIT ODDS & MODS
Co-Directed by Professors Caitlin Mueller and Sheila Kennedy, ODDS & MODS is a multi-year research and design initiative and the inaugural Spoon Climate Studio program at the Department of Architecture at MIT. ODDS & MODS expands the project of architecture to include the design of the built object as well as the design of materials and processes that proceed it and follow it at end of life—opening a wider range of material choices, decarbonization practices and possible pathways to the decolonization of building materials. Through projective design, critical thinking, computation, and machine learning (AI) ODDS & MODS seeks to create new architectural possibilities for the reuse of standardized materials (MODS) and geometrically irregular materials (ODDS), that until now have limited the scale up of circular approaches to design and construction. https://oddsandmods.mit.edu/
About WholeTrees Structures
Founded in 2007, WholeTrees uses the inherent strength of Structural Round Timber (SRT) and millions of years of organic structural engineering to provide beautiful, affordable, and durable biophilic structural systems that restore forests. Headquartered in Madison, WI, with teams positioned coast to coast, the company serves as the singular hub between well-managed forests, biophilic architectural designs, cutting edge 3D scanning and inventory management tools, and solid structural timber products and services. For more information, visit www.wholetrees.com
About KVA Matx
Sheila Kennedy, FAIA is a Professor of Architecture at MIT and a Principal with Juan Frano Violich of Kennedy & Violich Architecture (KVA Matx), an internationally recognized design practice that works at the intersection of architecture, digital tools and emerging public needs. KVA’s designs for mass timber buildings have received many design excellence awards and their innovative body of built work explores the material culture of architecture and advances locally sourced materials across regional ecosystems. For more information on KVA Matx and the TREE FORM Project, please see: http://www.kvarch.net.