Creating mid-rise apartment buildings that are both affordable and attractive can be a challenge. Architects must balance the desire to add exterior flair without busting a client’s budget.

On March 2, Simpson Strong-Tie released the Simpson Strong-Tie 2023 Fastening Systems catalog, a comprehensive guide to the company’s most recent innovations and product line expansions for wood, mass timber, steel, and concrete and masonry fastening applications.

GMS Inc. provided an update on the continued execution of its strategic priorities, including platform expansion and Complementary Product growth, with its acquisition of Jawl Lumber Corporation, which provides service to the Vancouver Island market in Canada under the Home Lumber and Building Supplies brand name.

Hurricanes devastated properties across the U.S. Virgin Islands a few years ago, including on St. Thomas, where the former Bluebeard Beach Club resort lost the roofs on all seven of its guestroom buildings, which also all suffered significant moisture damage.

Sto Corp. has teamed up with Pratt Institute and Passive House for Everyone as an advocate sponsor for the first-ever U.S. Collegiate Designed and Built rendition of the International Passive House Ice Box Challenge.

The Steel Framing Industry Association has launched the Industry Project Awards, an annual competition recognizing excellence in the use of SFIA-certified cold-formed steel products. Architects, engineers, manufacturers, distributors, contractors and others can enter projects in the 2023 competition, so long as the projects feature SFIA-certified CFS products and the entrants themselves are SFIA members.

The Standards Council of the American Iron and Steel Institute has formed a new group that will be primarily responsible for the ongoing development of AISI S250, North American Standard for Thermal Transmittance of Building Envelopes with Cold-Formed Steel Framing.

ClarkDietrich has named Brian Panuccio the company’s Chief Commercial Officer, a new role that will lead the sales and marketing teams as both the company and industry continue to evolve.

GMS Inc. announced that it has completed the acquisitions of Engler, Meier & Justus Inc. in Chicago and Blair Building Materials Inc. in Ontario, Canada. GMS also announced the recent openings of a new greenfield yard in Ontario and two new AMES store locations, which have all opened since the end of its last fiscal quarter.