A FILIPINO STYLE IS DEVELOPING ALL AROUND US WITH THE REAL-ESTATE BOOM. BUT ARE WE REBUILDING OUR HERITAGE OR CREATING OUR OWN? ABBY TAN INVESTIGATES THE CULTURE OF BUYING INTO CULTURE
Fringing Quezon province down in the bucolic region of Laguna, is Villa Escudero, a sprawling rice paddy and coconut plantation which, for many decades, has been a tourism showcase of the Philippines’ heritage in lifestyle and architecture.
Here an exciting makeover is taking place. Large chunks of agricultural land are being converted to bigger tourism complexes, like hotels and spas, and one portion is reserved for a residential housing complex. Both concepts are to be anchored in the heritage style of a bygone era, created through traditional-style houses in a setting with very modern amenities.
What’s taking place at Villa Escudero is a microcosm of what’s happening in many parts of the Philippines – frenzied development of facilities to meet tourist demand, and a real estate boom to meet a pent-up need for houses from the eight million Filipinos who are working abroad.
On the cusp of this boom is a growing fascination with the Philippine heritage style which is in demand by the first wave of Filipinos who went abroad to find employment 30 years ago, and are now returning home to retire.
“Home buyers realize that there are good elements in the Pinoy culture and they want to live in a Filipino house,” says Augusto Villalon Jnr, an architect and long-time advocate of all things Filipino in architectural design. It seems that buyers want a shot at living the rural, provincial Philippine life that heritage-style homes transport them back to.
Two projects are spearheading such plans – Villa Escudero in Luzon and Monterrazzas de Cebu in central Philippines. While the former goes residential and commercial, the latter, in the heart of Cebu City, is a prime residential development on a hill 350 meters above sea-level that affords every house owner a magnificent view of Mactan Straits and the resort island of Bohol.
The happiest person at this juncture is Villalon, who is architectural consultant to both heritage projects and, even happier still, owns the land that is Monterrazzas de Cebu.
Both projects share a similar objective towards maintaining and creating a Philippine design style.
In the makeover at the 400-hectare Escudero estate, the tourist facilities are being expanded – more hotels are to be built, and new attractions added such as spas, an 18-hole golf course, a water park and a casino. The private residential section will emerge as a heritage village where modern homes will be designed in the old style. The 200-hectare Monterrazzas de Cebu will initially be residential in theme, says Villalon, but it has room to add other tourist facilities in the future.
Hacienda Escudero, as the new development is called, has a head start as a tourist destination. Tourists get bussed every day to San Pablo, to sample rural Philippine life – to watch farmers plant rice and the plodding carabaos pull carts of coconuts, as well as dipping into the colorful fiestas.
There are a lot of heritage towns in the San Pablo (Laguna) and Quezon province area, so “it is logical to draw the heritage architecture from here. Hacienda Escudero will be the anchor of the heritage region,” Villalon adds.
An American consultant, RTRL, is drawing up the master plan for Hacienda Escudero.
It is likely, Villalon says, that the new development will retain the existing 1930s American commonwealth-era design of airy bungalows with balconies.
Monterrazzas de Cebu, on the other hand, is planned as the most exclusive address in Cebu. Here, the Filipino style that Villalon will emphasize will have the Visayan infl uence, which is different in detail from the Luzon heritage style.
Both heritage projects have brought in Landco Pacific as the partner developer. Landco is a pioneer in building exclusive Batangas beach communities like Punta Fuego, Playa Calatagan, and high-end mountain retreats and resort homes like Canyon Woods and Leisure Farms, both in Tagaytay.
Landco has joined the bandwagon to build high-end homes in provincial areas where Filipino overseas contract workers (OCWs) have been sending their money home. Alfred Xerez-Burgos III, senior vice-president for sales and marketing, was himself surprised to find that 70 per cent of house sales in Landco’s provincial projects like in Bulacan, Cabanatuan, and Pangasinan, all in north Luzon, were bought by professional OCWs.
Taal View Heights
Major housing developers, who have also gone out to the provinces to build housing estates for the middle-and lower-middle income OCWs, have reported that 20 to 50 per cent of their sales have been taken up by OCWs. Realtors are mounting sales blitzes every quarter to reach Filipinos working in the USA, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Australia.
The response explains the frenzied construction going on right now – from high-rise luxury to middle-income apartments in the Metro Manila capital area and middle-class bungalows and terraced houses in provincial cities.
The pent-up demand for housing has been so well felt that Ayala Land, the Philippines’ premier name in property development, climbed down from its high-end perch to cater to middle income groups and also to target the OCWs. Not only has the boom been keenly felt in Metro Manila but it has spread beyond Luzon, to the Visayas and Mindanao.
Some developers feel they have to offer more than a roof over future (now overseas) retirees’ heads, at home in the Philippines. They are also milking their nostalgia and homesickness, offering them a laid-back lifestyle in a Philippine heritage setting.
Monterrazzas de Ceb
The first developer to catch on to this idea was Ledesco Development Corp. It offers every lot buyer in its rolling hills project on the slopes of Tagaytay Ridge a view of Taal
Lake and Taal Volcano. Ledesco came up with architectural guidelines to persuade land buyers to build their houses in the heritage styles as found in the Taal Lake region. The centerpiece of this project is a wellness center that includes a spa and a yoga/ meditation corner facing the lake and volcano. About 40 per cent of buyers are Filipino-Americans who have bought the wellness-heritage packages, says Rene Ledesma Jnr, the developer.
He is sure his marketing strategy has resonated with the buyers who have found an affinity with their cultural roots. “The Filipino-Americans feel an affinity, a relationship with these types of houses,” he notes. “Those are houses they grew up in and they understand and feel for them.” So he has sold them a piece of culture and a fantastic view of Taal Volcano.
There is no set definition as to what constitutes Philippine heritage style. Generally, architects refer to anything pre-war as heritage.
But a heritage-style house in the present context could refer to any use of traditional aspects – it could be the sloping roof, the open balconies, or the use of carved wooden doors and capiz shells as adornments. In trying to pin down the heritage-style or plain Philippine-style home, designers are inclined to see them as modern homes, not a reproduction of old houses but houses that have “elements to remind you of traditional homes,” Villalon adds.
Filipino architects have been experimenting with Mediterranean styles (Spanish and Italian), and Balinese or Asian Tropical in recent years. Now a distinctively Filipino style may be emerging, if Villalon successfully guides along the two projects at Hacienda Escudero and Monterrazzas de Cebu.
The Filipino heritage home will be modern, he promises, just like the Thai and Bali modern styles. They do not need to be furnished with heavy wooden furniture, but rather with the modern world-class furniture that’s produced for the world market in Cebu, such as Filipino designer Kenneth Cobonpue’s designs made out of rattan and metal. He hopes that this style will also catch on in the ongoing frenzied construction of resorts and hotels all over the Philippines to meet the other boom – a tourism boom. Tourist arrivals in the Philippines have swollen to 2.84 million in 2006 and the infrastructure is under pressure to keep up, setting off a rush in tourism-related building.
Russians and Chinese are coming in great numbers, after the South Koreans who make up the largest tourist market in the Philippines. An airport is being built with
Korean finance in San Vicente, north Palawan, to service a planned huge beach resort and golf course to cater to the Korean market.
Prices of beach front properties there are already jumping, say observers, who foresee Palawan as the next big tourist destination for foreigners who want to build beach houses. The island, in the southwestern edge of the Philippines, may emerge as a haven for tourists’ holiday homes alongside the likes of Phuket and Bali.
The tourism boom has led to a shortage of good hotel rooms. Despite dire warnings that Boracay, the number one beach destination, is overbuilt, construction goes on unabated. Shangri-La Hotels are building a resort there, and Discovery Shores opened an ultra-modern looking boutique hotel last April.
Pico de Loro
Developers are also cashing in on “condotels”, where investors buy hotel room units and, in a lease-back arrangement with developers who operate them as hotels, recover their investments. Local developer DM Consunji has just put 18 blocks of three-storey condotels on the market, perched on a hill on the northern tip of Boracay. Palmerston Hotels and Resorts of the UK has bought a beach front property in the Fairways and Bluewater golf course is to build a 300-room condotel.
On scale alone, shopping mall builder SM Investments made a jaw-dropping announcement in May 2007 when it launched a 5,800 hectare eco-tourism village, Hamilo Coast, located just outside the mouth of Manila Bay, in Batangas province. This is the biggest known tourist beach and mountain community set-up. “It is a master planned area,” explains Josefino Lucas, senior vice-president of SM Investments, “where we promise to make it sustainable.” The apartments are to serve as the weekend homes of Manila residents with amenities that assure “a quality of life”. The developers have plans to build their own ferry terminal at the Mall of Asia, along Manila Bay, the third largest mall in the world that SM owns. The ferry will take tourist and visitors across Manila Bay to Hamilo Coast in 90 minutes, halving the time it would take by road.
Lucas indicates that this massive project maybe a life-long one, so developments go by pockets, beginning with the first of 13 beach coves. Called Pico de Loro, the first cove offers a beach club membership, and 240 apartments surrounding a man-made lagoon, SM is inviting brand name resorts like Banyan Tree to put up hotels there.
“We would like to set a guiding philosophy, to set a tone right from the beginning to develop responsibly,” says Lucas in explaining the SM’s objectives to protect the project area’s environment. The surrounding coral reefs have been damaged by dynamite fishers and parts of the mountains are scarred by slash-and-burn cultivators.
The Hamilo Coast project was unveiled soon after Ayala Land, the premier realtor, announced it has partnered Saudi-owned Kingdom Hotels Inc to build a Four Seasons Hotel and a Raffl es Hotel in Greenbelt, a top-end residential and commercial zone in Makati. At the same time, the government offered its prime tourist property the Bohol Beach Club in the Visayas to Kingdom Hotels for development into a world-class resort.
The real estate boom is a real demand, says Xerez-Burgos III of Landco Pacific, and is different from the 1990s boom which busted in the 1997 Asian crisis. A decade ago, the demand was speculative and catered only to high-end houses and apartments. “Right now, we are experiencing an emergence of the middle class,” he says. “In the 1990s the Filipinos went abroad (to work). Ten years later they have money to come back here to invest.” The newly-empowered earners are buying their first homes.
The view on the home construction horizon looks impressive, and the view on the booming tourist facilities seems endless. It’s just as well that the Philippine heritage style looks to be emerging at last.
HOW TO INVEST
Daniel Betancourt compares prices for desirable land and properties.
■ PHILIPPINES
Hacienda Escudero |
Hacienda Escudero
(Laguna) |
Terrazas de Punta Fuego |
● Terrazas de Punta
Fuego ● Alegria Hills |
Pico de Loro PHP2,400,000-11,000,000/ USD59,250/271,558 (condo units) www.hamilocoast.com |
● Pico de Loro, Hamilo ■ THAILAND The Philippine Constitution
only allows Filipino citizens
and corporations that
are at least 60 per cent
Filipino-owned to acquire
land in the Philippines, with
several exceptions including |
PHOTOGRAPHY: WALTER C VILLA
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