Bamboo

[++]

Construction manual (inSpanish) :

Eiffel Tower in bamboo, Indonesia, 1890:

[Señor Popcor]

I'm a fan of bamboo, such as for flooring for example. It also grows fast.

[++]

I'm a big fan of large grasses, worldwide. Not only is it a good=20 renewable resource, some of the products are greener for florring thatn=20 other materials.

Bamboo and related materials are used for a large variety of building=20 materials. Consider the use of chij grass for yurt building and=20 decoration. Some of the woven Kirghiz mats rival oriental rugs in their =

complexity and symbolism, not to mention the kinds of natural colors=20 used for dying the weavings, room dividers, mats for interiors of yurts, =

etc. Consider how adaptable grasses are to many climates as a building=20 material.

Sometime, for sheer gorgeous cames, take a peek at MOSO.

Here is a general article on large grasses:

Regards,

Galina

[Señor Popcor]

Interesting... I'll have to check out the links. I also like the odd piece made with stuff like rattan and similar (which can really warm up, and humanize a place), and have recently become suddenly interested in baskets and basket-weaves (for 3D modelling, too).

[Kris Krieger]

"Don" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

It has a tensile strength similar to that of steel, IIRC...

Expensive as bleep, tho', if you want to plant it in your yard =>:-p Which I can't figrue out, since it's a grass (member of the family Poaceae) and can be propagated by dividing up clunps and planting them...

[Señor Popcorn]

These days you can get some really great-looking high-end exotic stuff that would look simply fabulous in an upscale designer Manhattan warehouse loft-condo (notice the cliches), say a single item or 3 to spice up the place, but, ya, the stuff can be crackly, and if used a fair bit, and with a fair bit of roughness, start to come apart too.

[Señor Popcorn]

On the way to our university in China, part of the highway was closed for repairs and so we had to detour, and then the driver got lost. We took all these weird side "roads" and saw all kinds of funky sights to make me feel like I was cast within a frame right out of National Geographic... At one point, I turned to one of my American colleagues in the van and said almost exactly that...

Anyway, we passed an entire forest of Bamboo.

[Señor Popcorn]

Hey, cool, Don! Thanks for the entertainment... You were a real extra actor, though:

(script edit)

"...Only later, as he rollerbladed to a local internet cafe to check his email and alt.architecture and respond to one of Don's posts, and passed many a smiling and gawking pedestrian of east asian persuasion did a fractured remnant of that tortured existence return, but only briefly. "

[Michael Bulatovich]

"Exotic" is place and time dependant.

[Warm Worm]

'Relative', right?

[Michael Bulatovich]

'Relative', right?

Absolutely ; )

[Kris Krieger]

"Don" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

That's what I'm going to do with what I've gotten. Figure I'll divide the clump when the season is right (should be around Feb. in this area), same with the ornamental grasses, and distribute the clumps around the yard.

I might try mail-ordering some, haven't decided. But the local place has these huge pots, with a few culms, and want's, like, $275 per pot... I realize tehy're trying to earn a living, but that takes a bit too much out of *our* living =:-o

As for any that's growing either wild, or in abandoned lots; you have to be sure that (1) you have permision from the landowners to go onto the land and dig the stuff up; (2) the plant in quesion is not some sort of native protected species; (3) the plant is not going to run completely rampant in the yard once it's put into garden soil and/or receives fertilizer and regular water; (4) you're dividing the clump at the right time of year (i.e., the most dormant period) and that you're taking a healthy division (i.e., not dying culms at the center).

Since one can read up pretty easily re: (3) and (4), (1) and (2) are the most difficult part of it (and (1) is the most dangerous part, at least here in Texas )

I understand that some of the plants do have to be *originally* obtained from Asia and/or other far-off places, but it still seems that the plants should be easier to propagate than are a lot of other plants that cost less. It seems to me that it's got to do in part with the "exotic feel" of the plant, rather than the actual degree of difficulty...but that is merely my opinion/guess, not any sort of statistical or factual analysis...