One of the most interesting indigenous homes is the T’boli Gunu Bong, the “big house,” found in Lake Sebu. The Gunu Bong is wide, owing to the practices and composition of the family units living inside the structure, and the casual observer may notice an absence of physical partitions to divide sections of the house. The house looks like an entire roof on stilts of 2m. The roof slopes low…
Located in Poblacion, Balingasag, Misamis Oriental in Mindanao, the Vega Ancestral House is one of the 1st Transition Bahay na Bato inspired houses that have been standing throughout history, witnessing the different colonial periods of the Philippines. It has withstood an estimated 200 years of existence. The house has sculpted wooden Atlases known as “Oti-ot” in Cebuano, which provides support to the second-floor protrusion of the house. References: “Heritage Structures…
Filipino homes evolved into the Tsalet system during the American era. An emphasis on sanitation redefined architecture in the Philippines as history shifted from the Spanish period to the American period. This meant major changes in the designs of homes. The concept also carried over design lessons combined from the Spanish-influenced Bahay na Bato and the indigenous Bahay Kubo. This is a photo of Baguio City, an example of the…
During the days of Japanese occupation in World War II, a portion of Batanes would find itself as an important location in Philippine history. The Dipnaysupuan Japanese Tunnel, located in Tukon Hills, Batanes served as a lookout point by the Japanese against any approaching Filipino or American units. The tunnel actually comprises a network of tunnels. Dipnaysupuan served as a camp and shelter of Japanese troops who were fighting in…
Located in Metro Cebu, the Marcelo Fernan Bridge, then called the Consolacion Bridge, is an extradosed cable-stayed bridge and is currently the longest cable-stayed bridge in the Philippines. This bridge was significant for its engineering innovation in 1999. A cable-stayed bridge is a bridge which has one or more towers (or pylons). The towers serve as support for the cables that run across the bridge deck. A distinctive feature of…
The traditional Iranun house is called the Turogan. It consists of three storeys. First is the basement space or tunnel called Kuta or Bag’r or Pacsol. Historically, this was the portion of the house where residents hid when feuds or wars happened. Second is the main space for kitchen and living spaces where the residents sleep and also do domestic chores. Lastly, the tower is called gibbon, or bilik or…
In a bahay na bato, there are window shutters composed of louvre windows called the Persiana. These shutters are made of overlapping horizontal slats on window panels made of wood. The design objective of these louvre windows is that they let air come in to make the house cooler but deflect the sun’s rays, shielding the interior. Later on, it evolved into what we now call the Venetian Blinds but…
The bungalow was introduced to the Philippines during the American period. It is a small house of either a single storey or two storeys and is surrounded by wide verandas and has a sloping roof. The word Bungalow is actually derived from the Indian Hindustani word bangala, meaning belonging to Bengal. Bungalows were first built in mid-nineteenth century British for India. It was originally designed as an informal house that…
One of the more famous structures built during the Japanese occupation in the Philippines was the Ocampo Pagoda Mansion. This mansion in Quiapo, Manila, Philippines looks like a pagoda with a three-storey structure with a seven-storey tower at the northwestern corner. The vision of the design was a Japanese castle. This mansion was commissioned by Jose Mariano Ocampo on the eve of Japanese invasion in the Philippines in 1936 -1941…
One of the Chinese influences in the built environment of the Philippines are shophouses. They are usually found in Chinatowns in almost every major city in the Philippines. A shophouses is a building type that is both a commercial as well as a residential place. Usually the commercial space is at the bottom while the residential units are at the top of the building. These types of houses became a…
