Love the fabulousness of the Bamboo series of laptops from ASUS? Me too. Bamboo is one of the most versatile plants around and, because it is so easy to grow and renew, it has all sorts of lovely green credentials.
I was very curious to know how ASUS made their bamboo laptops – what the process was from bamboo shoot to slick laptop – and asked them what was involved. To start with the young bamboo saplings are hand-picked and trimmed. They do this in such a way as to limit wastage and keep things as efficient as possible.
Then they peel the bamboo skin so that the raw interior is exposed. This is the bit that gets used to make the notebooks. It’s the fresh, crisp “wood” that looks the best. The bamboo isn’t heavily treated like many other substances, a light treatment is all that’s needed to keep it lasting longer and looking natural.
For the next three days the bamboo is processed so that it prepares the bamboo for the next stage and further enhances the quality and texture of the wood. All the bamboo that makes it through this phase is then shaped and pressed into panels, ready to be made into gorgeous covers.
In the cutting stage, the wood is polished by machinery that’s designed to remove the flaws and blemishes and bring out the grain. It gets cut into ultra-thin strips that are further polished and glued together to form the final material. Then the bamboo is condensed and refined, gets UV protection and anti-bacterial treatments and is protected against scuffs and scratched.
Voila! A unique and natural laptop emerges out the other end. What’s really cool about using bamboo is that no laptop covering is the same. Because the materials are all varied and from different shoots, each laptop has a unique grain and appearance.
Now I am fascinated to know exactly what the treatment processes are and how they work. It would be brilliant to actually visit the factory and document each stage of the process in more detail!