Shrinkage of timber elements may lead to issues with architectural detailling. In this study the impact of shrinkage of wooden elements in relation to fire separation and acoustic separation is studied. How big is the impact of the shrinkage? On what structural parameters does it depend? What are measures to prevent problems with this shrinkage? The research is a combination of field research in existing timber buildings, (numerical) modelling of shrinkage induced problems and designing and detailling of new connections to overcome shrinkage problems in architectural detailling.