Guidebook on heritage homes to be launched

MANILA, Philippines - In a boost to local heritage tourism, Anvil Publishing together with the Intramuros Administration will launch on Saturday at Casa Manila in Intramuros a guidebook to some of Luzon’s treasured heritage houses.

“Philippine Heritage Homes: A Guidebook” is written by three well-known advocates of Philippine heritage structures: banker Jaime Laya, architect-planner Maria Cristina Turalba and antiquarian Martin Tinio.

Envisioned as the first of a series, the guidebook covers a sampling of old Luzon homes easily accessible from Metro Manila. Represented are examples of urban and provincial homes – some dating back to the 18th century – with architectural styles ranging from the traditional bahay na bato to art deco.

Entries for each home were written both to educate and to enhance a visit. These include the history of the house, how to get there, and what can be seen in it, along with insightful and interesting commentaries on architecture and interior design as seen through the expert eyes of Laya, Turalba and Tinio.

“Philippine HeritagHomes: A Guidebook” is being released at a time when there is renewed interest in local tourism, and a rekindled awareness of the country’s precious historical legacies.

As Laya points out in his introduction, almost half of the outstanding heritage homes catalogued in the years 2000-2004 by the NCCA and Sentro ng Arkitekturang Filipino, UAP has already disappeared, thus underscoring the importance of preserving what remains.

And as Turalba notes in the book, “... no flowery descriptions can equal the experience of leisurely feeling the breeze... or experiencing the onslaught on the senses of the lovingly crafted wood details in a bahay na bato.”