Google Doodle features Las Piñas Bamboo Organ on its 195th year

Google Doodle on Sunday featured the Philippines' Las Piñas Bamboo Organ to mark the unique instrument's 195th anniversary.

Las Piñas Bamboo Organ is "the oldest, largest, and only known bamboo pipe organ in existence."

Google said the construction of  the Bamboo Organ of St. Joseph Parish Church in Las Piñas in Manila took 8 years, using 1,031 pipes, 902 of which are made of native bamboo.

The organ is still operational to this day, playing daily for nearly 45 years since its reconstruction.

"In the 1880s, natural disasters severely damaged the instrument, silencing it until a restoration project started in 1972. The organ was moved from Las Piñas to Bonn, Germany, where it underwent a full reconstruction, returning to the island in 1975," Google noted.

On its anniversary in 2003, the organ was named a National Cultural Treasure by the National Museum of the Philippines.

"A monument to sustainable building and technological sophistication, the Bamboo Organ stands as a symbol of what’s possible when design draws from native resources, labor, and the ingenuity of its nation’s people," Google said. —Jannielyn Ann Bigtas/LBG, GAM News