“The first house on the left upon entering the historic district from the causeway is the ROCHA-SUAREZ HOUSE, which is unique in many ways. One of the very few houses on the island that has undergone professional restoration, it is among the few historic houses in the province in excellent condition after it was painstakingly returned to its nineteenth-century glory by restoration architect German Torrero in 2005. It is also one of the oldest, constructed in the early nineteenth century, probably around 1840 (Luspo 2006), by Julian Rocha, a wealthy merchant. The Rochas are a prominent family, whose descendants include such illustrious personalities as Antonio Rocha, a former mayor of Tagbilaran, and Fernando Rocha, the first elected governor of Bohol. Finally, the Rocha-Suarez House is one of the very rare ancestral houses now used as a museum, containing an excellent collection of imported and Boholano eighteenth- and nineteenth-century furniture and houseware items on the upper floor. Meanwhile, the wooden ground floor, originally a bodega for merchandise, now houses a gallery. The building displays many, now very rare, architectural and structural features, such as coral stone foundations, corbels supporting beams, and a wooden skirting (sanipa) covering the floor beams of the volada. Inside, massive newel posts adorn the exterior staircase, and the main double door, whose doorjambs with pegs carved in rosettes are unique in the archipelago. The sala sports an original tray ceiling with an English chandelier, and is supported by twenty corbels beneath the beams (Tinio 2006). Except for the ill-matched low-pitched, galvanized iron-sheet “modern” roof, replacing the original and more appropriate steep thatch roof, the house has remained virtually unaltered since its heyday almost two centuries ago, and, having continuously been lived in by the same family, offers a rare insight into the life-style of a prosperous merchant during the Spanish period.”
Text from the book Casa Boholana: Vintage Houses of Bohol, by Erik Akpedonu and Czarina Saloma, 2011
Bohol Vintage Houses 