Very little infrastructure comes free from the landscape.ĭespite their organic nature, the bridges that the Khasi make are superior to many of the alternatives. That’s an unusual feature of living bridges too. There are multiple techniques, often highly localised, and generally using free materials available from the forest. As the bridge takes shape, new roots can be wound in to support it, or to create handrails and barriers. Sometimes roots are encouraged in the right direction with bamboo scaffolding, sometimes not. They begin with manipulating and overlapping supple young aerial roots. They are long-term projects, and inherently social: the person that first starts the bridge may not live to see it fully functional, and future generations will keep tweaking them for as long as they remain in use. Some of the bridges in daily use today are centuries old, and these bridges are sturdier than the new ones.īecause they are alive, root bridges are always a work in progress. As the trees grow and the roots thicken, the bridge becomes stronger and self-sustaining. Take, for a start, that is the only form of infrastructure that gets stronger over time. They are unique, beautiful, and they have a whole series of advantages. What the Khasi do is create living bridges out of the intertwined roots of local fig trees. This is architecture without architects, and also without buildings. I say architecture, though this stretches the usual definitions considerably. But at the Our Time on Earth exhibition last week at the Barbican, I was rather impressed with an exhibit that learns from the indigenous architecture of the Khasi tribe in Meghalaya, north-east India. I expect most of us have at some point crossed a river or a ditch using a tree – either a fallen one, or a tree in just the right place.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |