Throughout Asia and the orient, bamboo has been a staple building material and food source for centuries. Known for its rapid growth and overwhelming, and sometimes uncontrollable expansion, bamboo may soon find its way into your home. Today’s designers and builders are taking cues from their eastern neighbors in an effort to find safe, environmentally friendly, and interesting alternatives to today’s conventional building materials.

    Bamboo is a grass, and is considered the fastest growing plant known to man. Thousands of species flourish throughout the world, with most varieties centered in Asia and South America. Today, bamboo is being grown and harvested throughout the United States by a number of different companies in properly managed forests. Although there are many different species, bamboo is grouped into two categories: the running and the clumping. Both sprout from rhizomes; yet the roots of the common running variety may double their length each year, while the clumping variety continues to send out roots from the original plant. The rhizomes in both plants form a dense root system that acts as a natural erosion barrier. These vivacious growing characteristics make bamboo an extremely hardy, and rapidly replenishable natural resource.

    Most varieties can be harvested on a five year cycle, compared to the normal 30-60 years of conventional framing lumber and hardwoods. Reaching upwards of 120 feet, bamboo produces a fiber with the density of the hardest hardwoods, and a tensile strength comparable to steel.

    In addition to bamboo’s many uses as a building material, the plant in its natural living state, generates more oxygen than a similar-size grove of trees. A small stand of bamboo can reduce the temperature in its immediate environment by as much as ten degrees.

    Bamboo is being used extensively for fences in the United States. Influenced by traditional Japanese fences, today’s domestic uses include arbor’s, gates, trellis’, and many other garden structures. Comparable to cedar, in it’s durability, bamboo will continue to divide yards, and enhance our garden experiences for years to come. Bamboo fencing can be custom ordered, or purchased in pre-made panels from a number of domestic retailers. Typically constructed and tied with black poly twine, fencing can be attached to existing chain link or other fencing material, or applied to a new pressure treated structure. Fencing manufacturers suggest keeping bamboo a minimum of 1" from the ground.

    In addition to fencing material, bamboo has seen a resurgence lately in the home furnishing market. Some of the fencing companies are also selling tableware, place mats, and various containers. Other companies are marketing chairs and couches. And of course, many old stand-by’s are still being produced, including chopsticks, steamers, tatami floor mats and Japanese tea sets.

    Smith and Fong, a San Francisco-based firm, is manufacturing flooring and paneling products under the brand name of Plyboo. Plyboo flooring is comparable to typical wood flooring in its installation and finishing. Plyboo wood flooring is very stable, and expands or contracts only half as much as a red-oak floor.

    In the building trade, bamboo has been used for scaffolding for centuries. Recent advances in the building trade have focused on earth friendly alternatives to the traditional manufacturing processes. Additional discoveries have found that certain species of bamboo are naturally rot resistant, therefore eliminating the use of harmful insecticides. At the same time, researchers are also testing low-toxicity insecticides and fungicides to repel pests and diseases. Non-toxic adhesives are slowly replacing the noxious glues that are currently being used by most furniture manufacturers.

    Bamboo is also being considered as an ecologically responsible agricultural crop for third world countries. Some environmentalists are suggesting bamboo crops as a remedy for deforestation, and the tragic displacement of agriculturally based societies. One company out of Seattle, Washington, cultivates shoots in a controlled environment and ships them by air to repressed areas of the globe. These satellite farms grow and harvest the crops, and ship the raw material back to the U.S. for manufacturing.

    It may not be obvious to the casual observer, but the race to find sustainable resources for the next millennium is well on its way. Bamboo is definitely a contender, and will continue to play a vital role in the production, construction, and decoration, and finish of our environmentally-friendly homes of the future, and now.

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