The Green School – a bamboo laboratory in Bali, Indonesia

How can we attract the curiosity of young people and make sure they take an interest in the environment, the future of the planet, and construction with sustainable materials?

The best thing is always to set a good example, as this school laboratory project does, earning it a nomination for the prestigious Aga Khan Award for Architecture in Southeast Asia in 2010.

The building, made out of local bamboo, a “green” material cultivated by the local community using sustainable methods, is situated on a campus which itself has a virtuous ecological footprint, using alternative energy sources such as a bamboo chip burner, solar panels and a hydroelectric generator.

All the buildings on the campus, with the Green School at its heart, are made using bamboo as the primary construction material, revealing its many possible applications in architecture.

The project, dating back to 2006, is by John and Cynthia Hardy, who wanted to encourage the community to embrace a sustainable lifestyle using locally available materials. They founded the “Green School”, the Meranggi Foundation for the promotion of bamboo plantations and PT Bambu, a construction firm.

In this project they attempt to avoid further exploitation of rainforests by using bamboo: an easily renewable, quick-growing construction material which produces excellent aesthetic and ecological results.

Design: PT Bambu
Location: Badung, Bali, Indonesia
Photographs: Aga Khan Award for Architecture / PT Bambu, Aga Khan Award for Architecture / Akhamul Hakim
Link: http://www.akdn.org/architecture/