A bamboo house costing P4, 000 or about 77 USD per square meter made by a young Filipino won the top prize of the Cities for our Future, an international competition.
Earl Patrick Forlales made the low-cost and environment-friendly house with bamboo as the construction material being robust and long-lasting and grows anywhere in the Philippines.
The project which Forlales call “Cubo” started when he was staying in his grandparents’ house which has bamboo materials too.
Cubo wowed judges from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) which met the optimal ergonomics.
RICS President John Hughes and the competition head judge said the projects satisfies what constitutes a comfortable, clean, and safe place to live in. The judges agreed to the simplicity of CUBO and its ability to solve global slum problem since the plant can thrive even on poor quality land and still be harvested yearly.
Forlales took home over P3.5 million in prize money which he said will be used to fund the realization of his project with an identified target location and plans to start construction next year.
The young designer hopes that the funding will be put to good use with the Manila slums in mind and dreams of building houses in different parts of the world.
