![]() ![]() The material CUBO uses is an “engineered bamboo”-treated and laminated to prolong its life, then processed into plyboard and dimensional lumber. “We’re trying to shy away from the notion that bamboo doesn’t last long, that we can’t use it for long-term housing.” Inside a CUBO modular home. “What we want to establish is that bamboo is no longer a material that’s fit only for rural or farm housing, but that it could also be suitable for cities,” Forlales says. And, bamboo crops create cleaner air, providing 35% more oxygen and absorbing 40% more carbon dioxide than trees. ![]() Its compression strength is higher than concrete, its tensile strength rivals steel, and it’s lighter than both materials. ![]() Bamboo is fast-growing, shooting up to three feet per day. CUBO uses bamboo, a material abundant in the Philippines, to build homes. I spent most of my childhood there.”įorlales used this time-tested design as a point of departure to develop the CUBO concept, which he sees as an apt solution for the country’s urban-housing problem. They had this bahay kubo, and it’s just a simple and functional home. “Whenever my mother would go to work, she would leave me with my grandparents. “It’s very dear to me because I grew up in a bahay kubo,” Forlales says. CUBO’s modular bamboo homes can be assembled on-site in four hours. It has a steeply pitched, thatched roof constructed from nipa palm hardwood stilts for posts and bamboo slats for walls and floors. These tiny houses lend themselves to rapid construction, taking only a week to manufacture off-site and just four hours to assemble on-site.įounder Earl Patrick Forlales drew inspiration from the Philippines’ native bahay kubo, a hut-like structure typically found in rural areas and small towns around the country. Homegrown start-up CUBO is looking to reverse this trend with its modular homes made from bamboo. If left unaddressed, the housing shortage could affect as many as 12 million people by 2030. But with its increasing urbanization, a housing crisis looms: Out of a population of more than 100 million, an estimated 4.5 million Filipinos are homeless, with around 3 million homeless in Manila, the nation’s capital. The Philippines is one of Southeast Asia’s fastest growing economies. ![]()
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