Build a house

When a Malagasy person builds a house, there are rituals and rules to be respected. One of these is about which direction one’s house faces. All the houses in Madagascar face the western side due to some cultural sentiments attached to it. Malagasy belief states that the best sunshine is in the afternoon as the sun starts to set, so all houses should open up facing west. In the traditional building process, the east façade is closed off with no windows or doors. Windows are usually only located in the north, and doors in the west.

Houses are typically rectangular and crowned with steeply angled roofs. In rural areas, most houses are made of either mud and wattle or woven matting supported by poles. In the eastern forest, they are built of interlaced split bamboo and are thatched with palm. The architecture of Madagascar is unique in Africa, bearing a strong resemblance to the construction norms and methods of Southern Borneo from which the earliest inhabitants of Madagascar are believed to have immigrated.