Render of the interior of Roosevelt’s forthcoming presidential library. The facility is being constructed with mass timber and steel elements. Image: Snøhetta | JLG Architects

The build is led by US contractor JE Dunn Construction with Norway-based Snøhetta and North Dakota-based JLG Architects overseeing the design.

The project should be familiar territory for JE Dunn, which has worked on multiple civic-cultural projects in the past.

These include the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, and the Sobela Ocean Aquarium (all in Missouri), as well as the City of Cedar Park Library in Texas, the Welcome Center at Lakewood Cemetery in Minnesota, and renovations for the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum in Missouri.

Located on a hilltop near Roosevelt’s eponymous national park, the library includes a curved mass-timber roof designed to mirror the surrounding Badlands terrain: rugged, eroded landscape of buttes, canyons, and layered rock formations.

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The structure is designed to use about 1,800m³ of cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glulam beams, supplied by Mercer Mass Timber (MMT). Mercer is a Canadian-German supplier of engineered wood materials with facilities in British Columbia, Canada, and Washington, US, serving the North American market.

Phase one focused on the museum building and its complex roof structure, which required precisely engineered connections and joints supported by steel wrapped in wood to maintain a seamless timber appearance.

MMT also provided the engineered wood systems used throughout the build.

Ricardo Brites, director of engineering, MMT, said, “From custom-made glulam connections to a curved roof profile that’s as complex as it is beautiful, this project sets a new bar for civic architecture.�

Rammed earth walls and a hybrid timber-steel frame are also said to support the project’s zero-emissions, zero-waste ambitions.

Phase two of construction is scheduled to start 1 June and includes installation of canopy supports for solar panels. The library is scheduled to open 4 July, 2026, aligning with the 250th anniversary of US independence.

Artistic renders of the future Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library facility and site, located in North Dakota, US. Images: Snøhetta | JLG Architects