Balaanong Bahandi is your ultimate guide to the Archidocese of Cebu’s architectural heritage.

After much blood, sweat and tears, so to speak, our book, Balaanong Bahandi: Sacred Treasures of the Archdiocese of Cebu will be launched formally today, 26 November 09, 1830H at the Cathedral Museum of Cebu. It is by invitation only.

This book is on churches and other religious edifices built in the Philippines during the Spanish colonial regime, 1565-1898. The forms, materials and construction techniques of these edifices will be discussed, along with their furnishings such as religious statuary, paintings and vessels.

Rene Javellana, SJ’s Fortres of Empire book is perhaps the best reference, so far, to introduce the reader to the fortifications in the country. These are oft forgotten aspect of Philippine heritage and the dark history that it represents. It is not too large and is full of beautful colored pictures of structures, details as well as places. Archival imagesas well as artist’s rendering and isometric drawings of some forts and watchtowers are included.

To mark the Diamond Jubilee of the Archdiocese of Cebu, the Cathedral Museum of Cebu and the Archdiocesan Commission for the Cultural Heritage of the Church will soon launch the book Balaanong Bahandi: Sacred Treasures of the Archdiocese of Cebu.

Great Churches of the Philippines by Pedro Galende, OSA and Rene Javellana, SJ is one of those books that you just have to get, pour over and read again and again. A lightweight tome that presents these architectural gems with its distinct Philippine style in a new light: beautiful pictures with short but concise text.