Bahay na Bato

Bahay na bato is a type of building originating during the Philippines' Spanish Colonial Period. It is an updated version of the traditional bahay kubo. Its design has evolved throughout the ages, but still maintains the bahay kubo's architectural basis which corresponds to the tropical climate, stormy season, and earthquake-prone environment of the whole archipelago of the Philippines and fuses it with the influence of Spanish colonizers and Chinese traders. Thus created was a hybrid of Austronesian, Spanish, and Chinese architecture. Its most common appearance is that of an elevated, overhanging wooden upper-story nipa hut that stands on Spanish-style solid stone blocks or bricks and posts as foundation instead of just wood, bamboo stilts, or timber posts. Roofing is either Chinese tiled roof or thatch , of which many today are being replaced by galvanized or other modern roofing. It followed the bahay kubo's arrangements such as open ventilation and elevated apartments used as living space with the ground floor used for storerooms, cellars, and other business purposes. Like bahay kubo, much of this ground level was reserved for storage; in business districts, some spaces were rented to shops. Horses for carriages were housed in stables called caballerizas. Bahay na bato had a rectangular plan that reflected vernacular Austronesian Filipino traditional houses integrated with Spanish style.It was popular among the elite or middle-class, and integrated the characteristics of the nipa hut with the style, culture and technology of Chinese and Spanish architecture. The 19th century was the golden age of these houses, when wealthy Filipinos built fine houses all over the archipelago. The same architectural style was used for Philippines' Spanish-era convents, monasteries, schools, hotels, factories, and hospitals, and with some of the American-era Gabaldon school buildings, all with few adjustments. This architecture is still used during the American colonization of the Philippines. After the Second World War, building these houses declined and eventually stopped in favor of post-World War II modern architecture. Today, these houses are more commonly called ancestral houses, due to most ancestral houses in the Philippines being of Bahay na bato architecture.
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