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This is at once a compendium for designers and an entertaining essay on the architecture of Asia's most glamorous tropical island by one of its foremost admirers. Landscape and architectural designer Made Wijaya draws on his photographic archives, compiled over the past thirty years, to present a visual study of Balinese architecture: its origins, elements, variations, and vagaries.

The book opens with an overview of Balinese architecture and then looks at its basic elements--the walled courtyard and the pavilion. Further chapters examine building materials, ornamentation, and architectural hybrids resulting from other ethnic influences. Progressing through the book, Bali's intricate built landscape becomes legible and ever more surprising.

With a sharp eye for trends, and passionate opinions about how Balinese design principles should be applied, Wijaya enhances his survey of traditional Balinese architecture with examples of its adaptation in modern private houses and boutique hotel architecture on Bali.

In addition to Wijaya's own archive photographs, the book is illustrated with the work of internationally acclaimed artists; specialist photographers including Tim Street-Porter and Rio Helmi; as well as drawings by Chang Huai-Yan and Deni Chung.

This remarkable book is for anyone interested in ethnic architecture. Designers will find it useful as a source book for materials, built form, and ornamentation and ideas about the use of space. Lovers of Bali will want this for its documentation of a rapidly changing world.