abaca

In the living room, there’s a graphic abaca rug in the shape of a slithering snake.

With its slightly prickly fibers, the abaca rug from Belgian firm Limited Edition adds another note of coarseness, while the custom velvet sofa and bronze coffee table ooze sensual luxury.

Balangiga, a small coastal town about 600 miles southeast of Manila, was important for its trade in abaca, a kind of hemp used in making rope and ship’s rigging.

From a helicopter, “we saw the devastation of coconuts, abaca and the forests. There are lots of houses without roofs,” Lorenzana said by text message.

The tropical was in jellyfish motifs, tropical fruit prints, stunning cobalt blue dyes and in an inventive linen material that mixed abaca - woven wild banana - with pineapple yarns.