A074 - Experimenting Bamboo as an Architectural & Socio-Cultural Feature

Arte-Polis 3 International Conference on Creative Collaboration and the Making of Place 1

Ph.D. Budi FAISAL; S.T, Putri KINASIH

Experimenting Bamboo as an Architectural & Socio-Cultural Feature Case Study: The Bamboo House at Eco-Pesantren Daarut Tauhiid, West Bandung, West-Java, Indonesia Ph.D., Budi FAISAL Lecturer - Architectural Design Research Group School of Architecture, Planning and Policy Development Institute of Technology Bandung INDONESIA [email protected] S.T., Putri KINASIH Junior Architect KFA Studio, Bandung INDONESIA [email protected] ABSTRACT

A house can be defined as merely a dwelling, or beyond. Further, it is a unique association of people, culture, and technology; since its creation is often derived from the basic understanding of the user (people), the habit (culture), and the building technology. The basic idea of this house is to create a sustainable living space using bamboo as an ignored indigenous material. This house featured bamboo as the main building material since it has become one of the most famous indigenous materials in West-Java for ages. For the Sundanese, bamboo is the expression of their creative well-being through the art of craftsmanship. As a building material, bamboo is considered as one of the sustainable materials for its renewability, restorability, and versatility. It is also well-known for its forming flexibility, resistance of earthquake, low construction cost, and its abundance. In this house, bamboo is utilized both as structural and ornamental elements used in interior and exterior of the house as column, flooring, wall, stairs, and blinds. Its combination with modern materials (concrete, masonry, steel) creates a rich visual experience within the house. To create a sustainable building is to ensure its sustainability capability in its design process, construction methods, and materials used – furthermore, in its ability of altering the user’s lifestyle subtly. Designed as an eco-responsive building, the house was planned to have minimum interference with the nature. The 9 existing 37 years old clove trees within the site are preserved and the building’s ground level is elevated. This house is managed to use the natural air flow and lighting, taking advantage from the abundant sunlight of tropical area and fresh natural mountain breeze. By preserving the bamboo-tradition, the house is also inexplicitly preserving the collective creativity of its native society. Keywords: house, bamboo, environment-friendly, indigenous material, sustainable material, collective creativity

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FASHIONING SUSTAINABILITY

The Global Issue The first use of the word sustainability in connection with the environment was in 1980s in a publication produced by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (UCN) in Gland, Switzerland, entitled World Conservation Strategy, in which sustainability was inextricably linked to development.4 As the global issue related with environmental degradation and the global climate change comes up, the word sustainable, or sustainability, has now become more popular than it was before. Later on, it is becoming a word describing certain lifestyle, or certain approach, that emphasized ecological and environmental preservation. Thus, sustainable architecture can simply be defined as an ecological-responsive architectural design.5

The National Coordinative Department for Disaster Survival (Bakornas PB) record shows that in Indonesia nowadays natural disasters related to the climate has raised 400% compared to those in 1950 – 1960s. It is forecasted that 75 – 250 millions of Africans will suffer for water-insufficiency whilst most cities in Asia will cope with flooding. The worst case scenario is, when the Earth’s temperature keeps rising, Indonesia will lose approximately 2,200 islands caused by rising of the sea-level. Coastal cities like Jakarta, Semarang, and Surabaya are definitely in danger. And even Banjarmasin, which elevation is under the sea level, might be drowned and lost. The raise of the sea-level will also decrease sea-water’s pH and damages the coral-reefs, threatening the marine-ecosystem-chain.6

Architecture is likely playing an important role in facing the environmental degradation. Building design has become an important aspect in responding the global climate change effects. The buildings’ contribution in the total CO2 emission reach the number of 40%, including its construction process, material supply, and energy necessity.6 A building should therefore be designed as sustainable as possible to lessen its carbon-footprint. Buildings built in a well-equipped infrastructure, preferably utilizes the existing infrastructures, will be able to fulfill almost all of its user’s needs (business, school, transportation) without disturbing the existing nature. The less money spent to establish the new infrastructures, and the less unnecessary environmental intervention. Yet creating a sustainable environment in this existing consumptive world might demands more creativity than we’ve ever thought. A Perfect Place to Start: House Architecture can be defined more than just a settlement or shelter for the mankind. It makes tangible meanings; it produces concrete metaphors of the ideals and beliefs of a group. Architecture can provide settings for certain activities; remind people of what this activities are; signify power, status, or privacy; express and support cosmological beliefs, communicate information; help establish individual or groups identity; and encode value systems. Also to separate domains and differentiate between here and there, sacred and profane, men and women, front and back, private and public, habitable and inhabitable, and so forth. The fact is that most people, if asked, would probably say that architecture began as shelter. After all, the first buildings were dwellings, and people need shelter to survive. Yet shelter is not the only, or even the principal, function of housing.7



Architecture is a language, a physical expression of custom, habit, trend, culture, and even authority. It is a cultural record from the tapestry of humankind. In order to take a part in applying the sustainable-lifestyle, a house is a good example to begin. A house is one of human basic needs besides food and clothing. As the smallest unit of the neighborhood, it has become a place where we learn our first moralities. In regard to environmental awareness, building design, construction methods, and building materials can play an active role in coping with the global environmental degradation. We can start sharing the lifestyle with our children from their very own early-ages in our own house. We must, then, teach them: how to conserve water; how to recycle rainwater; how to put plastic; glass, paper and organic waste into different garbage bins; how to plant vegetables and specific plants for medicine; how to collect falling leaves and mix them with organic waste for composting. Thus, designing a sustainable house not only deals with physical terms but also deal with a sustainable lifestyle. Our own house is a perfect place to start. THE BAMBOO HOUSE AT ECO-PESANTREN DAARUT TAUHIID “Exploring Bamboo, Utilizing Second-Hand Materials, and Respecting the Environment”

To create a sustainable building is to ensure its sustainability capability in its design process, construction methods, and materials used – furthermore, in its ability of altering the user’s lifestyle. Designing a house, in other hand, might means continuing the tradition, preserving the local wisdom. The Bamboo House is located on the Eco-Pesantren Daarut Tauhid’s housing complex, approximately 1,000 m above sea level, in the North-Western Bandung. Eco Pesantren is an Islamic Institution which is trying to apply sustainable development principles in its physical development. It was designed in 7.4 Ha area which comprises a mosque, farming lands, public school, student’s dormitories, and housing; and vision to be the sustainable community model, developed based on Islamic-philanthropic principles. To enhance its neighboring communities’ welfare, it shares numbers of community-empowerment activities. Figure 3 Site Plan of Eco-Pesantren Daarut

Tauhiid Figure 4 The Bamboo House

Source: Faisal 2009



The Bamboo House was designed on the 622 m2 piece of land, with the main entrance facing south. The 9 (nine) existing 37 years old clove trees are remain preserved in site and also become part of the house’s design. To respect the existing clove trees, the building mass is divided into 2 (two) three-storey-masses, connected by a bridge and a porch. The first mass consists of 2 bedrooms including the master bedroom, kitchen & dining area, pantry, living room, and a studio, whilst the other part of the house comprises 2 children’s bedrooms.

Figure 5 The Nine Existing 37 Years Old Clove Trees

Figure 6 Rural Area View in the Neighboring Area

Source: Faisal 2009

Figure 7 Ground Floor Plan (left) & 2nd Floor Plan (Right) Source: Faisal 2009

This three storey house is facing south and adapting the sustainable concepts in its design – not only in its air, water and waste handling, but also the material selection. The house uses bamboo as the indigenous sustainable material for its main material selection. The material is used extensively and innovatively, not only as a matter of exterior/interior decorations but also as the structural elements, including plastered bamboo walls and composite bamboo for columns, retaining wall and floorings. Although the bamboo traditional construction has been used for centuries in West-Java, it has gradually been replaced by modern construction; therefore, in the beginning of the construction, the architect himself refreshed the labors to do the construction work, especially when bamboo is combined with new/modern materials.



Figure 8 Composite Concrete Bamboo for

Retaining Wall Figure 9 Composite Concrete Bamboo for

Floor Figure 10 Bamboo Parquette for Flooring Figure 11 Plastered Bamboo Wall

Source: Faisal 2009

In this house, traditional bamboo weaving is used for plastered wall and for divider panels. Modern bamboo weaving is also entailed as kitchen back-splash, ceilings, and fence as well as treated as wallpaper. It is interesting to note that all traditional bamboo weaving can easily be done by common labor, meaning the craftsmanship – the skills and the knowledge – still exist in the society. Although modern bamboo weaving with new specific design can only be constructed by people who lived in remote areas in Southern Bandung, it doesn’t mean that common labor cannot do the modern waving. The common labors usually object to put more effort on the new design because they need to allocate more crafting-times.

Figure 12 Modern Bamboo for Kitchen Back-splash

Figure 13 Modern Bamboo Weaving for Wallpaper

Source: Faisal 2009



Figure 14 Various Use of Bamboo as Decorative Elements Source: Faisal 2009

Besides using bamboo as the main material, this house also utilizing second-hand materials for many purposes, those are: plywood, steel roofing, doors, beams, windows, and window-frames. Most of these materials are collected from old Dutch building remnants around Bandung City. In fact, surprisingly most of the time, the quality of second-hand materials are better than the new one. The reduction in use of new materials creates a corresponding reduction in embodied energy (energy used in the production of materials).8 Accordingly, utilization of second-hand materials becomes one of the green-building-design principles.

Figure 15 Second-Hand Materials Used in the Bamboo House (rasamala wood, window frames, particle board, roof shingles, etched glass, steel)

Source: Faisal 2009 As an eco-responsive house, the Bamboo House was made to have minimum contact with the existing nature. This is shown by the elevated floor decking to minimize building’s coverage and contact with existing soil. Located in Bandung, Indonesia has also made the house gifted by abundance sunlight, heavy rain water, and high level of humidity, as any other places in the tropical areas. Thus, the house has wide wall-openings to optimize the natural-day-lighting from the sunlight during the daytimes. As another treatment to optimize the abundance of tropical sunlight and heavy rain water, this house is planned to be equipped with solar panels and rainwater harvesting unit. Black water from the septic tank and



grey water from the kitchen and bathroom is designed to be filtered biologically in the constructed wetland before its overflow go into the city drainage.

Figure 16 The Extensive Use of Bamboo: Blinds, Stairs, Ceilings, Wall, Door Source: Faisal 2009

CONCLUSION

This house is trying to show us, how bamboo – the ignored indigenous material – can be utilized up to its extreme possibilities, not only for decorative uses but also for structural purposes. In other hand, instead of casting or burning the second-hand materials into the wasteland, this house use them in a very eloquent way, thus they significantly enrich the final outlook of this house. The ignorance of preserving craftsmanship in our modern life must become our collective concern because craftsmanship is the expression of communities’ creativity. It is an accumulative proved skills and knowledge. We strongly need to preserve it; otherwise, we will lose one of the most precious cultural heritages in our lives. We will be alienated from our own history before finally losing our identities. In this regard, exploring the art of bamboo in this house is a noble effort. This house simply shows us how “culture” meets “nature”, how man-made religiously respect God-made, how the design of this house humbly interweaving within the 9 (nine) existing 37 years old clove trees. As a matter of fact, this is the very essence of the co-existence itself. Moreover, the Bamboo House is an articulated example of building a sustainable thoroughly, not only sustainable by design it is also socially sustainable. The house shows that sustainability is a word beyond physical impact. It is related both with nature and culture. By preserving the bamboo-tradition among its native Sundanese society, the house is also inexplicitly preserving the collective creativity of the cultural community.



ENDNOTES

[1] (Widjaja, Keragaman Bambu dan Potensinya untuk Kehidupan Modern, 2009, pp. 1-2) [2] (Widjaja, State of The Art of Indonesia Bamboo, 2003, p. 3) [3] (Purwito, 2009) [4] (Steele, 1997) [5] (Tanuwidjaja, 2010) [6] (Arif, Permanasari, & Badil, 2009) [7] (Snyder & Catanese, 1979) [8] (Wikipedia, 2010) BIBLIOGRAPHY

ARIF, Ahmad, PERMANASARI, Indira, & BADIL, Rudi (2009). Hidup Hirau Hijau. Jakarta: Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia.

LOPEZ, Oscar H. (2003). Bamboo, the Gift of the Gods. Bogota: D'Vinni Ltda.

MORISCO. (2009). Karakteristik dan Implementasi Bambu dalam Struktur Bangunan Modern. 2.

PURWITO. (2009). Pengolahan & Produk Turunan Bambu Sebagai Material Alternatif. 1.

SNYDER, James C., & Catanese, A. J. (1979). Introduction to Architecture. NY: McGraw-Hill.

STEELE, James (1997). Sustainable Architecture. NY: McGraw-Hill.

TANUWIDJAJA, Gunawan (2010, April 19). Green Impact Indonesia. Retrieved April 20, 2010, from Wordpress: http://greenimpactindo.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/%E2%80%9Csustainable-architecture%E2%80%9D-berapa-hijaukah-rumahku/

VITRA DESIGN MUSEUM. (2004). Grow Your Own House. Simon Velez and Bamboo Architecture .

WIDJAJA, Elizabeth A. (2009). Keragaman Bambu dan Potensinya untuk Kehidupan Modern. Bamboo Festival: Bamboo for Modern Life (pp. 1-2). Bandung: Asri.

WIDJAJA, Elizabeth A. (2003). State of The Art of Indonesia Bamboo. Retrieved November 2006, from CGIAR: http://www.ipgri.cgiar.org/Publications/HTMLPublications/572/ch25.htm

Wikipedia. (2010, April 15). Retrieved April 21, 2010, from Sustainable Architecture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_architecture

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A074 - Experimenting Bamboo as an Architectural & Socio-Cultural Feature