About
In addition to designing, Ambet also finds meaning in sharing knowledge and guiding people in the creative process.
In 2014 he founded Houtbaar Workshops under which he managed to combine these passions.
Participants were guided in making objects and furniture with manual and traditional techniques.
Since 2013, Ambet has been working at Luca School of Arts and KULeuven as manager of the wood workshop and the mixed media lab.
Here he supervises students of Architecture, interior design and fine arts in their creative processes.
In 2012, he founded Ambet Manalo as a design label.
With a focus on functionality and simplicity, Ambet Manalo creates objects and furniture with an essential core, to cherish and to pass on.
In the developing process there is always a balance exercise between the material, the proportion and the soul of the object.
Slowly and reflective – in a combination of new and traditional techniques, with sustainable (local) materials, meticulously elaborated and completed – an appealing end product comes about.
Coming from a family of makers, both in Belgium and the Philippines, he discovered the value of craft already at a young age.
In 2008 he graduated as a designer at the Luca School of Arts. A part of his studies took place at Politecnico in Milan.
He is a driven autodidact constantly in search of new and traditional manufacturing techniques in order to maintain the challenge of the creating process.

With a focus on functionality, simplicity, Ambet Manalo creates objects and furniture with an essential core, to cherish and to pass on.
In the developing process there is always a balance exercise between the material, the proportion and the soul of the object.
Slowly and reflective – in a combination of new and traditional techniques, with sustainable (local) materials, meticulously elaborated and completed – an appealing end product comes about.
Coming from a family of makers, both in Belgium and the Philippines, he discovered the value of craft already at a young age.
In 2008 he graduated as designer at the Luca School of Arts. A part of this studies took place at Politecnico in Milan.
He’s a driven autodidact constantly in search of new and traditional manufacturing techniques in order maintain the challenge of the creating proces.
In addition to designing, Ambet also finds meaning in sharing knowledge and guiding people in the creative process.
In 2014 he founded Houtbaar Workshops under which he managed to combine these passions.
Participants were guided in making objects and furniture with manual and traditional techniques.
Since 2013, Ambet has been working at Luca School of Arts and KULeuven as manager of the wood workshop and the mixed media lab.
Here he supervises students of Architecture, interior design and fine arts in their creative processes.
In 2012, he founded Ambet Manalo as a design label.
