A group of Native Hawaiians pulled out a 50-foot Macaranga tree they chopped down in Waimānalo. The plant, which is highly invasive, was used to build the last hale for the 13th Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture.
The 28 hale, or houses, will dominate the floors of Festival Village at the Hawaiʻi Convention Center. Each Pacific nation and territory will have its own structure.
The trees for the hale are set to be piled onto a truck from Waimānalo to the Convention Center today, according to Joey Valenti, the co-founder of the Albizia Project. The company aims to restore native ecosystems by using invasive Albizia trees as building materials.
"The final one was easy," Valenti said, adding that the last hale took less than an hour to build. "Because of that repetition, our team is very proficient in doing this now."
The final build-out of the village is scheduled to be completed by June 4.
The hale are built from invasive Albizia, Macaranga and even Gunpowder trees. The last one gets its name because it was once used to make charcoal for gunpowder.
But all three trees share similar characteristics.
"We wanted to do something that was easier to erect," Valenti said. "We have a very short timeframe to build, so we've selected those species for that specific reason. They're lighter in weight, they're accessible, and there was enough of them."
Valenti said it took about three months to build all 28 hale.
The crews even built two additional mockup hale to practice assembling.
The thatch, or the roof, of the hale is made of handwoven palm leaves, received from a company in California.
The project is a collaboration between festival planners, Architects Hawaiʻi, Albizia Project, the sovereignty group Nation of Hawaiʻi and the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.
DLNR removed more than 1,000 trees from about 2 acres of land in Waimānalo. Crews have labeled the parts of the hale, so the final build-out at the Hawai'i Convention Center will go smoothly.
"The way we've set it up is every part is labeled, color-coded and numbered," he said. "When we take these off pallets at the convention center, they will go up almost like an Ikea kit. So every part has its place."
But that doesn't mean it was an easy job.
Linda Lileikis, a project director at Architects Hawaiʻi, said she wanted to make the festival village realistic.
"This was a huge challenge for us to take a sterile environment like the convention center exhibition halls, which is over 200,000 square feet, and turn it into something very dynamic and bring the outdoors in," Lileikis said.
The hale are about 20 feet wide, 30 feet long and 18 feet tall. Lileikis said they're about a fourth larger than a traditional hale, depending on its use.
The festival village will have a projection of star constellations, as well as multiple stages for cultural performances.
"That will project a day-to-night sky image of constellations, and really what you would see if you were a Polynesian navigator coming from that South Pacific region and sailing here to Hawaiʻi," Lileikis said.
