An extremely versatile and useful material, bamboo can be found in everything from food to scaffolding. Although technically a type of grass, many of the one-thousand or so varieties of bamboo worldwide can give any tree a good run for its money in terms of height – up to 40 metres – and girth – up to 30 centimetres.

As a renewable source of material, bamboo is also hard to beat, often reaching its full height in just a single season of growth. It achieves this by being the fastest growing ‘woody’ plant on the planet. The phenomenal rate of growth is attributable to the internal structure of the stems – or ‘culms’ – which suck up moisture along straight tubes whilst its dense foliage converts sunlight into the energy needed for growth to take place. The fastest-growing varieties increase their height by over 30 centimetres in a single day, with reports of even 1 metre of growth in a day. Some people have actually claimed to have perceived the growth of bamboo with the naked eye as the plant grew.

The wood produced by a bamboo plant is light but very tough. The common Thai variety Thyrsostachys siamensis is known by locals as ‘iron bamboo’. Wood is only taken from mature plants of over one year in age, whose stems have become sufficiently hard after the initial year of growth. Bamboo wood is known to be vulnerable to infestation by insects such as the small beetle Dinoderus minutus which if left unchecked will bore into the centre of a culm and reduce the core to powder. For this reason, all bamboo items featured in the Lanna Thai Crafts online store are specially treated using a time-honoured method. First, the crafted but untreated bamboo is left to thoroughly dry out. It is then smoked in a shed using the smoldering bark of a mango tree. The action of the smoke destroys any parasites and seals the wood for future protection. The bamboo can be left in the smoking shed for anything from 1 to 3 days depending the desired finish. Lengthier smoking will produce a darker auburn colour.

The new shoots of the bamboo plant are now well known worldwide as an integral part of Asian stir fried food. A little less well known is the use of the actual pith of young bamboo plants for pickling and for use as a condiment to accompany a large variety of dishes. Its light weight but unusual strength also make it a common sight on construction sites. Last but not least of course, it makes for the durable and naturally attractive material from which many of the products at the Lanna Thai Crafts online store are made.