Bamboo
SUPERSTRUCTURE
Bamboo is one of the fastest growing plant. It has been used in Asia for many centuries for scaffolding and more rencently to reinforce concrete while giving it flexibility against hurricanes and earthquakes.
Applications
Bamboo is a building material, 50 times more resistant than oak but lighter than steel or concrete: flexible, aesthetic and ecological. It is not only used in architecture for houses, bridges or cathedrales but also for walls, clothing and paper. Barrel DeBoer praises “strength, longevity and beauty” of this material, one can transform it into floor, partition walls, kitchen cupboards and furniture, all of which in a great variety of natural colours. For him, bambou architecture was revolution thanks to mortar and bolts for assembly, a technique invented by Simón Vélez twenty years ago. Vélez method consists to fill mortar with stems and knots, and then to fix them with bolts.
