HEALTHY PATHOGEN-FREE INTERIOR INNOVATION

Experts believe there are about 1600 species of naturally growing bamboos around the world and 64% are in the Southeast Asian region. 33% in the Latin American region and the 7% is in Africa and Oceania regions of the world.

For centuries in the Philippines, especially in the hinterlands, this grass called bamboo, is the poor man's building material, readily available all the time and cheaper too. They even cook food, stock food and keep valuables in it. Bamboo poles as long as seven feet are utilized as water containers fetched from a nearby spring and some as long as a meter are used as containers for gathering coconut wine and some as long as 6 inches are bamboo mugs used to drink the coconut wine from. The poor people using them are found consistently disease free and healthy because it is discovered just recently by scientists that bamboo can kill a number of bacterial species at the rate of 99.8% on a longer span of time and has a deodorizing effect owing to its bamboo kun composition and its Lyocell fiber surpasses that of a wood Lyocell fiber on the negative ion effect and antibacterial property. It is purely organic and non-toxic in nature - (absence of pesticide and inorganic fertilizer inputs to make it mature in three years unlike trees that takes in at least fifty years. Cutting trees allows the danger of us losing underground water reserves in the long run.)

In designing interior spaces, bamboo, due to its natural anti-bacterial property, can be an appropriately suitable material to use and not only that, it is a perfectly healthy alternative at this modern age and time where mysterious maladies like SARS and A(H1N1) scare and worry everyone. It can be used as a germ killing, hygienic, sterile and clean walling materials and flooring, furnitures; cabinetry and tables in bedrooms, bamboo breadbaskets for serving bread in the dining room and on picnics and baskets for storing soiled linens, clothings and undergarments. Its fabric, having 3 times longer lifespan than cotton, can be used as a germ killing wall cloth, pillowcases, blankets, bedsheets, curtains, clothing materials for surgical people and patients in hospitals where 99% possible cross contamination is always present, can be a perfect undergarment material, in socks and shirts, in towels and bathrobes, and practically the list is quite lenghty. No longer can it be called a poor man's material for building but really a perfect one if we aspire for a sanitary, high tech and innovative interior space and household items - the perfect choice for an operating room grade interior space and a truly healthy lifestyle in this day and age where there are no more easy answers regarding health care.