This three semester design module sequence establishes the foundation for Masters level creative practice design research in architecture. It provides the students with an opportunity to select from a variety of studio topics; thereby allowing them to choose the themes aligned with their individual interests and intellectual drives—while creating synergy with their studio leader. Framing design as a creative practice, the objective of the module is to develop a high level of competency in creative practice research, leading to architectural outcomes, which are in turn, aligned to the faculty’s expertise and interests. Students are expected to demonstrate a high degree of proficiency in creative practice research, design thinking, representation and communication. This module demands that students not only deploy creative practice research methods; but also translate research outcomes into actionable strategies in architecture.
Advanced architectural thinking and clear practice-based research methodologies applied to architectural discourse are expected, alongside mature representational techniques that communicate ideas through non verbal and verbal mediums.
options researchdesignstudio
The Architectural Design Research Report is a 4000-word report with images— A4 hardcopy and PDF compendium— that would capture research, design, and presentation materials on the student’s design research. This report should build and elaborate on a body of evidence through creative practice research, using writing, images, and diagrams. The report will then synthesise these design research efforts into a full-length design research compendium that complements evidence with textural descriptions, theoretical writing and other written strategies, alongside graphic, photographic, and visual materials. Its fundamental purpose will be to enable students to develop a rigorous method and deep-dive focus in a specific area of design research. Students will be required to mount a body of evidence to demonstrate that their research has translational potential in the field of architecture through creative practice which is to be evidenced in the design thesis. Students will also be expected to exercise high-level competence in creative practice research, design thinking, representation and communication.
ALVIN TAN YONG JIE | CHIN WEN XUAN | TOH WEI WEI
Springpod Humanity
ANDY MOK | GOH YIFAN | TENG YING SHI
Rall.way
CHING YU HAN | MARSHA ISMAIL
The Tale of Two Cities
CHOI SEUNG HYEOK | ZHANG PENG
Oriented with the wind
GOH KAR HUI | RIFQI ASHRAF BIN ROSALI
Hoarding and its implied boundaries
LIANG WEIYI | LU KAIYU | ZHANG RUIJIA
Towards UniverCity: A Quantitative Urban Design Approach to NUS-One North Area Multicentralism
ALEXANDER TEOH JIE HAO
The Storytelling Mill
OPTIONS STUDIO
CHOO HUI ZHI
City of Anamnesiology: A Tapestry of Time
CLARENCE CREDENSA TAN
ALCHEMY GARDEN
DE SOUZA JOSHUA ANDREW
An Urban Retreat
HARRY LAM
CHAOSMOS
OW YEONG JUN JIE
Tactile Story
RYAN NEO
reCOnnect
TAN WEI JIE EUGENE
Devices, Detournements, Demonstrations: reframing the polyphony of home on Pulau Bukom
ZHU SHENGBUWEI
Creative Factory Mall
CHOON WONG YEN GABRIEL
え... あの...あなたの下着ですか?
DERRICK CHUA JIN XING
Verdant District
GARG ATUL
ART ECHO
NIGEL CHEW EN YI
Wind Scenes
REBECCA CHONG SHU WEN
A House for Touchy-Feely People
SEETOH HUI YI, JESLYN
The Giving Place
TENG FANG HUI
The Sanctuary
CHLOE LAU JIA YEE
The Forest Farm
World Machine
Humans and AGI, Becoming Space
Faring
World Machine functions as Springpod Humanity’s Space and Technology Exploration Tower (STET). It serves as the mecca of aerospace and technologies innovation and advancements. The facilities provides training grounds for humans and AGI to collaborate and create, in response to the active provision of data from the first humans on Mars. There are multiple spheres through STET, each with specialised laboratories (private spaces for industry experts, scientists, reseachers etc). As AGI and robotics are fully integrated in the lives of residents, Makerspace, fixed and portable (decentralised) will provide neccesary equipments and resources to organically involve the community in innovation. The community ecosystem welcomes people all over the world with diverse skillsets to pilot and realise human inhabitation on Mars and other planetary bodies. In this mission, everyone is a stakeholder and spaces are designed to live, work, socialise, play, experiment and innovate, to foster a cohesive community inspired by space exploration.
World Machine Aerial Perspective
Chin Wen Xuan (Y5S1)
Studio by Fung John Chye
Forestries 2050
To a worm in horseradish
Soil and root studies are essential in understanding the carbon sequestration potential of trees for practical use in urban environments, yet current assessments only consider above-ground accumulation of carbon rather than digging deeper. In imagining a forestry lab in 2050, a spatial spectacle is formed through the physicalisation of what is often not seen, allowing a public approach to understanding the roles of deep root systems and soil pedogenesis in influencing carbon storage. Underground ecologies of mycology are able to flourish, enabling studies on mycelium biomaterials. A community is activated through the open experimentations of using organic, plant-based, low-emission substrates from fungiculture or horticulture as a means of constructing lived habitats for humans.
Forestry Labs
Toh Wei Wei (Y5S1)
Studio by Fung John Chye
SpringPea
Food and Farmers of the Future
The SpringPea branch of the SpringPod City provides the inhabitants of the city the majority of its fresh produce and processed food through a combination of aquaponics, hydroponics and advanced protein producion facilities. The addition of a biofuel facility allows, any waste products produced by either facilities to be immediately recycled into usable electricity by its inhabitants, facilitating a circular ecosystem within the tower.
The SpringPea City serves to connect its inhabitants to the food that we consume on a daily basis. Rather than the decentralised approach that most cities take with regards to food production, the tower brings people face to face with the food, people and work involved with producing it. Integrating a Pod transport network within the structure of the ring and a robust pedestrian thoroughfare to transport goods and people throughout the city.
Protein Production Facilities
Tan Yong Jie Alvin (Y4S1)
Studio by Fung John Chye
Section of Ring Spaces
Springpod Humanity 2050
Launching humanity to above and beyond
In our masterplan, we envision majority of the ground-scape freed up as bioretention swales with a varying composition of communal programs. More bio-detention basins not only mitigate flood events (which impede the enjoyment of groundscape recreation spaces) but also provide a programmatic opportunities for citizens to participate in water and nature activities. Majority of ground space freed up for landscape as bioretention areas allows for future-proofing and a reduced reliance on canals’ capacity to withstand extreme flood conditions.Streets on outer end of ‘circular circulation’ -- distinct separation of transportation and living space; fast and slow; private and public. In an inversion of the typical notions of ‘external’ space being for public living, this concept is turned on the head as internal public courtyards on multiple scales are now gradually stacked within the intimacy of the inner building spaces; while private living is relegated to the outer bounds, peering into the boundless edges of the forested landscape.
Tan Yong Jie Alvin (Y4S1)
Studio by Fung John Chye
Chin Wen Xuan (Y5S1)
Toh Wei Wei (Y5S1)
Its SpringPod not SpringPoo
The Healing Punch
A Botanics Hub | as part of Rall.way
‘The Healing Punch’ consists of a tea district and a flora district, both aiming to provide a therapeutic experience for all users. These programmes are strategically situated such that they are conveniently accessible via the different linkways and are designed to integrate with nature, creating a new ecosystem within and beyond the site.
Flower terraces are enjoyment spaces for Man but are also pollination opportunities for birds and bees; research towers are working spaces for Man but are also temporary shelters or drinking spots for birds. The teahouse is also designed for Man to have close contact with nature: the water body around the tea huts, as well as the roof where it becomes part of the PCN and can attract enthusiasts to observe the different bird species.
Goh Yi Fan (Y4S1)
Studio by Joseph Lim
The Farm Oasis
Where Food Meets Nature
Studio by Joseph Lim
Andy Mok (Y5S1)
We are what we eat. The food we ingest has direct effects on our health, our state of mind, and our overall well-being. Yet, most of our nutritional needs are met by sources beyond our control, understanding, and sight. To cater for the rising demand of cities, food production has turned to large farm operations and closed-door factories, detaching modern societies from their food sources.
Sited right in the heart of Singapore’s northern Agri-tech and food-corridor, ‘The Food Oasis’ reintroduces the linkage between food production and city life. Research, production, and recreation will be strategically situated within the vast greenery where a variety of programmes intertwine. Curated to lure the attention of the transit commuters, drivers, pedestrians, and surrounding residents, physical linkages extend beyond to the Republic Polytechnic and adjacent neighbourhood, providing direct accessibility and visual experiences.
From the RTS experience to pedestrian journeys, a series of research and development buildings are sunken, sited on, and elevated above ground based on their specific programmatic requirements for interaction with the landscape. Greeneries, water bodies, and connected structures are therefore the common grounds for research, recreation, and production, forming ‘The Farm Oasis’ within the concrete jungle.
Eden Of Healthcare
A healthcare and quarantine facility for the Post-Pandemic Society
The current pandemic has shown the world that greater emphasis is needed on healthcare infrastructure in order to be prepared for the future events. The Kunming- Singapore railway ambition is to be constructed as part of the Belt and Road initiative between China and Southeast Asia countries. The proposal of our TOD allows a smooth entry from Malaysia, Johor to Singapore, facilitating a seamless travelling experience. The Eden of Healthcare is co-located with the Rapid-Transit Station(RTS) & Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (CIQ) facilities.
Teng Ying Shi (Y5S1)
Studio by Joseph Lim
Institutions like hospital and clinics permeate our daily lives and has significant effect on how we live in the world and individuals are not willing to sacrifice freedom for public health and living in a state of fear and insecurity. The prolonged Covid-19 pandemic is likely to have a long-tail effect on mental health. The facility envisaged the most efficient and long-term utilization of the resources for the epidemic of any future outburst of pandemic.
The Eden of Healthcare proposes a healthcare facility for compulsory quarantine with the provision of healthcare systems within the green spaces. It proposes to provide spaces for quarantined persons with spaces for interactions while obeying social distancing. They will engage quarantined people constructively, creating a positive environment and help reduce the stress they go through. Landscape and nature are integrated within these to contribute to the visitor’s healing emotional distress within this restorative environment of prolonged quarantine facilities within a restorative environment.
Rall.way
Woodlands T.O.D. Masterplan
Rall.way is a rejection of a typical Transit-Oriented Development (TOD): one that is usually dense and heavily built up. The intervention almost serves as an extension from the existing Admiralty Park: a juxtaposition against the currently indoor centric Woodlands Square. Through integrating research and recreation via landscape and wetlands, opportunities are provided for work, leisure, and play, boosting the wellness of researchers, locals, and international visitors alighting from the Rapid Transit Station (RTS). The masterplan also serves as a front door for international exports, ranging from flowers to fishes as a result of the new RTS, affirming Woodlands’ identity as a research and recreational marketplace where exchange in culture, knowledge, and food products can occur.
Split into three hubs: healthcare, agri-tech and botanics, they all aim to provide a calm, peaceful and multi-sensorial atmosphere for the users, a step away and a drop in tempo (rallentando) from the rapid and busy atmosphere in a typical TOD.
Andy Mok, Goh Yi Fan & Teng Ying Shi
Studio by Joseph Lim
The Tale of Two Cities
“Achieve your interplanetary dreams”
The Tale of Two Cities is a conceptual project that is set in 2050, exploring the relationship between the two cities that have emerged from an industry of space debris management and the social structures informed by them. As a consequence of decades of space debris, it poses threat to interplanetary space travel. Stratum Corporation forefronts the space debris management industry by creating a new geological material out of space debris. While a new geology is born and serves Stratum Corporation as a floatation device for the settlement, it also marks the edge of a new underground city. The Tale of Two Cities explores the productive potential of extreme densification due to toiling for the credit system. While the Stratum borders on the neo-colonial master plan that is imposed from a singular seat of power, the Burrow surrenders to wilderness. Climate change or space debris in this project is no longer a technological problem, but rather an ideological one, rooted in culture and politics. The Tale of Two Cities is simultaneously an extraordinary speculative image of tomorrow and an urgent examination of the environmental questions facing us today.
The Burrow Marketplace
(Y5) Ching Yu Han & (Y4) Marsha Ismail
Studio by Simone Chung
Section of Stratum Corporation & the Burrow
Oriented with the wind
Bringing vernacular passive design strategies into modern pasars
Studio by Florian Heizelmann
Zhang Peng(Y4S1)
Choi Seung Hyeok(Y4S1)
Strategy1: Zeer pot is a pot-in-pot refrigerator. It is an evaporative cooling refrigeration device which does not use electricity. It uses a porous outer clay pot containing an inner pot within which the food is placed. The evaporation of the outer liquid draws heat from the inner pot. The device can cool any substance, and requires only a flow of relatively dry air and a source of water.
Strategy2: A rain garden is a depressed area in the landscape that collects rain water from a roof, driveway or street and allows it to soak into the ground. Planted with grasses and flowering perennials, rain gardens can be a cost effective and beautiful way to reduce runoff from your property.
Strategy3: Venturi effect roof makes to increase wind speeds for a good ventilation. Improving the ventilation helps evaporating water inside the soils better. Furthermore, rain-water supports the water system of zeer-pot storages to maintain the low temperature inside.
Oriented with the wind
Bringing vernacular passive design strategies into modern pasars
Studio by Florian Heizelmann
Choi Seung Hyeok(Y4S1)
Zhang Peng(Y4S1)
Indonesia is a very fascinating tropical country, and Bandung, as a city in the java basin area, is even more distinctive. Today, when the traditional market is gradually forgotten, we hope to solve the hygienic problem in the traditional market through passive and low-tech methods, and put in a shared kitchen to attract the flow of people. While the shared kitchen promotes market shopping, it has also become the center of neighborhood communication. This design attempts to create a neighborhood market with comfortable temperature, clean and sanitary conditions. The current situation in Kiaracondong pasar is chaotic. The relationship of stakeholders in this market have collapsed, and the arrangement of selling items for each stakeholders has also failed. Accordingly, various issues happened in this traditional market.
We start with sanitary conditions in the market. Kiaracondong pasar has the vulnerable condition to control the spread of bacteria into foods, so we started to study about microscopic organis and tried to improve the building environment. We have done analysis on bacterial infection rates to produce and plot it on climate conditions. By overlaying this statistics against human comfort zone and Indonesian weather, I’ve separated the areas into proper environmental zones for human and bacteria. We designed different environmental spaces in a building by applying Zeerpot and Venturi-effect concepts, so that each space fulfills the different requirements of items as well as human. Also, I tried to make a sustainable, integrated system for them with landscape and rain-water.
Hoarding and its Implied Boundaries
Constructing Shared Atmospheres for the Unhoused
Studio by Jimenez Lai
Goh Kar Hui & Rifqi Ashraf (Y5S1)
Set in the context of a hot summer season in Los Angeles Skid Row, the proposal explores the notion of climatic inequality in the unhoused population of the United States.
Artificial climates strongly drives the concept of the architecture where the project intervenes at the level of public programmes such as the retail stores, cinemas , the libraries and supermarkets that use excessive climatic appliances, this becomes design opportunities where the architecture can tap-on to create curated leakage of climatic atmospheres that manifests in the form of an artificially conditioned environment in the streets for the unhoused to utilise.
The proposal tells the story of how architecture attempts to collapse the economic statuses of both parties - the architecture deals with the conditions of excess climatic appliances involving multiple retail stakeholders to provide or share their comfort and environment with the unhoused. It ultimately empathises by stressing the notion of climatic equality between the two parties and talks about the subversion of the hoarding phenomenon through an excess of quality of air, thermal comfort, visibility and communication appliances.
Towards UniverCity
A Quantitative Urban Design Approach to NUS-One North Area Multicentralism
Liang Weiyi (Y4S1)
Lu Kaiyu (Y4S1)
Zhang Ruijia (Y5S1)
Studio by Patrick Janssen & Rudi Stouffs
Towards UniverCity
A Quantitative Urban Design Approach to NUS-One North Area Multicentralism
Liang Weiyi (Y4S1)
Lu Kaiyu (Y4S1)
Zhang Ruijia (Y5S1)
by Patrick Janssen & Rudi Stouffs
Studio
The city has grown familiar. The demise of cities lies not in their destruction nor denigration, but in their familiarisation. We leave the city for another city; we search out novelty and the interesting, for the known has become stifling, and the familiar inundating. Thus arrived the banalisation of the world. Upon this tenor emerged the direction of this project—to defamiliarise the familiar, to render an alternate image of the city, to dramatise its phenomena.
To dramatise is to conceive a story, and a story derives its impetus from characters. Through cartographic investigations of taxonomies around Downtown Singapore this project mapped the city in the pursuit of uncovering characters: it employed alternate modes and objects of representation through a series of maps, of which one, here, is shown.
The city’s characters, hitherto nameless and nebulous but utterly energetic, sprawl about the city. In their wanderings, the flaneurs awaken these characters, baptizing them in a narrative; through imagination they achieve spiritual transcen-
The Storytelling Mill
Studio by Victoria Jane Marshall
The Commodified City of Imagination
The Commodified City of Imagination
dence, as how the ancients performed rituals to cross from reason to myth—the flaneurs enter the imagined city, the dramatised city, where distant times invade and stories unfold beneath their feet. But who are the flaneurs? Indeed every person is, for we are but protagonists in our personal myths. What are our journeys through the city but stories of our voyages through its labyrinth of dreams, where we encounter characters strange and fantastic, and uncover the tales embedded in the streets, and in turn inscribe our own?
Within the train station was a hypothetical society therefore conceived. Lodged underground, and standing at the beginning and end of journeys, the train station is threshold and meeting point, uniting comings and goings, where time unravels into the few minutes between each arrival, each departure, where space is transitory, and the journey alone remains, salient and saturated in story. It seats itself as a collector of journeys, a Storytelling Mill that collects the stories of the people and translates them into written narratives.
The Forest Farm
Chloe Lau Jia Yee (Y4S1)
The forest farm is a pit stop for healthier alternatives and wellness related experience. It is a experiential and demonstration farm whereby its focus is not on the production of food towards food security, but instead it seeks to raise awareness on our eating habits and encourages a shift towards a healthier version of ourselves and our planet by imparting knowledge and providing a fulfilling wellness related experience to visitors.
Situated right next to one of the two entrances into Lim Chu Kang and along one of the three most popular cycling routes in Singapore, the forest farm presents itself as a pit stop, encouraging visitors, both planned or unplanned to step into its rich food forest ecosystem which is teeming with life. Apart from the food forest which the farm buildings reside in, there are 3 other demonstration zones which enhances the experience.
Studio by Teo Yee Chin
The Future of Food
The farm questions the promises of a greener future made by farms of the future which incorporates technology and energy-intensive farming practices. Instead, the forest farm adopts the food forest permaculture practice of imitating forestlike structures to increase the biodiversity, efficiency, and sustainability of food production systems. Through utilizing nitrogen-fixing and nutrient-accumulating plants as well as the chop-and-drop techniques, the forest farm contributes directly to the future of food by allowing for much more life within a single area. As such, the crops to be cultivated in the forest are chosen based on their potential as plantbased diet and as part of the food forest ecosystem.
Drawing inspiration from the multilayered nature of the food forest, the roof form and the walls of the farm buildings engage in a playful conversation with the food forest. As the various crops layers corresponds with the verticality of forests, the farm buildings respond with a play of roof ridge and eaves as well as wall heights.
City ofAnamnesiology
A Tapestry of Time
Studio by Khoo Peng Beng
Choo Hui Zhi (Y5S1)
Imagine an alternative Singapore in which we grew organically based on the evolving needs of humans – minus the tabula rasa – and we allowed our kampong villages to evolve, old trades to be preserved and our thriving biodiversity to continue propagating. What was once a bustling Teochew fishing village and market, Kangkar was a multicultural and multireligious village – with Catholicism being the primary religion - that was livened with festivals and teeming with biodiversity. Coconut plantations nestled among primary forests and were visited by wildlife animals like tigers and crocodiles.
Memories is likened to a palimpsest, which layers information with time. Traces can be effaced and overwritten by new ones. Similarly, this city follows the traces of the past based on the typological heritage, natural history, cultural heritage and programmatic memory of the past, while evolving with modern needs. The product is a city of contradictions in memory – while it tries to retain memories of the past, it seems like amnesia is the inevitable fate of the city. With the uprise in technological advancements, buildings soar in the sky, flying houses are no longer a distant dream and farmland can harvest crops unattended. However, as we progress as a city, we are too consumed with fads that we become stuck in a vicious, never-ending chase for the next novel thing. We no longer can distinguish which memories are real or fake and our memories of the past more hazy and distant.
Is That Your Undies?
The notion of ski is one that reduces the spectatorship of its audiences to curated man-made infrastructure along the seemingly natural ski field. Though its purpose for safety and emphasise on the quality of the ski field is established, it limits the participtation of its viwers and its ability to be versatile in today’s volatile pandemic state. Rethinking where ski fields can be located, the city of Tokyo is reimagined as a palate of surfaces for integration of ski sports.
The river landscapes of Tokyo have always been widely bastardised since the city’s focus in urbanity and image making. As an attempt to reintroduce the energy of water, the sport of ski is inserted into the existing river typology to react and charge the everyday life and operations of the city as its new contingent ski field. Water is carried up from the storm drain under Shibuya station, and brought into the ski field structures as chilled water. From there it is mixed with liquid nitrogen to produce fine ice particles that helps lubricate the ski surface. As such, the river and its water is synergised with the city once again.
Gabriel Choon (Y5S1)
Studio by Tsuto Sakamoto
ALCHEMY GARDEN
The Resource Optimist
Alchemy Garden salvages and repurposes discarded scrap materials found in Singapore. Materials are reassembled into a new campsite located at former British Royal Air Force sports field, Padang. The site synergises with adjacent developments in resource flows, harnessing waste as an opportunity for pedagogy and production. The campsite offers an alternate outdoor adventure learning experience in Changi to groom a new generation of resource optimists, at the same time nurture a culture of collaborative consumption and production that builds urban resilience and eco stewardship through active participation. Assembled from a kit-of-parts of salvaged scrap materials, each camp cluster harnesses specific component reuse. An alchemy of salvaged parts creates an anomaly of cues and affordances for campers to explore beyond the architecture and the ecology that surrounds it. Alchemy Kitchen transforms salvaged materials into a series of DIY field kitchens distributed across the site, educating and demonstrating the varieties of low impact cooking through an alchemy of flavours.
Clarence Credensa Tan (Y5S1)
Studio by Cheah Kok Ming
[Alchemy Kitchen]
Lodge, Masterplan, Field Kitchens]
Verdant District
Biophilic and Therapeutic Archi.
Living with the endemic COVID-19, there are periodic lockdowns and safety measures to prevent virus spread. In 2020, there were 452 suicide deaths and 29 COVID-19 related death cases in Singapore. On top of the fear of virus and being uncertain of the future, people may face other issues such as overcrowding at homes and being stuck in a place for too long due to the increased stay-home hours. It has also resulted in the increase in social isolation, and also caused higher levels of stress for people living with the new norm. In the existing public housing (HDB) design in Singapore, there is a lack of creative play spaces for youth and children. Additionally, the inability to travel abroad resulted in the lack of leisure and attention restoration activities for the residents. As such, there is are limited means of getaway from the usual routine of work life in living with the Endemic COVID-19. Thus, this project aims to alleviate and improve the mental well-being of the resident’s stressful life of living with the endemic COVID-19.
Derrick Chua Jin Xing (Y5S1)
Studio by Tan Beng Kiang
The design seeks to create spaces of stress relief, play and leisure to be within reach and ensure it is accessible for all users both within and outside of home. As such, it is also crucial to provide the opportunity for spontaneous activity to occur for play and physical activity of space to increase social interaction in micro community level. The design also aims to provide comfortable and safe spaces against the endemic COVID-19.
The design strategies include bringing the park elements to the storey planes with the “Park in the Sky” Concept. This includes 4 key biophilic patterns that are crucial in green spaces in residential developments based on the case study from SkyVille and SkyTerrace while other biophilic pattern serve as supporting attributes.It also includes diversity of connected green spaces along circulation paths to enhance the biophilic user experience in their day-to-day activities.
An Urban Retreat
Flexicity | Lifestyle Venue
Re-activating the Pasir Panjang Waterfront | Drawing on the Past
Prior to land reclamation works in 1971 and the subsequent establishment of the container port, Pasir Panjang used to be a popular beach and recreational destination hosting regattas and other water sport activities. With the waterfront being largely inaccessible to the public since 1971, the Breakwater Retreat taps on the FlexiCity studio master plan guidelines and returns the waterfront and waters to the public. The project draws on history and reintroduces watersport activities and waterfront living to the area for all to enjoy.
With the masterplan specifiying a 100% publicly accessible ground level, the projects rethinks the typology of a lifestyle venue and includes both public and private spaces. Fronting the decommisioned Pasir Panjang Power Station, the project draws on the architectural language of the power station.
When Daybreaks.
the Breakwater Retreat comes to life with a range of commercial, hospitality and recreational offerings catering to various interests and demographics. Indoor and outdoor plaza’s and the promenade play host to events while the waters come back to life with through water recreation.
Joshua Andrew De Souza (Y5S1)
Studio by Ar. Richard Ho Kong Fatt
When Nightfalls.
the north facade building illuminates like a lantern through the use of teracotta screens and pefrorated panels along the resorts corridor spaces. Four oversized cylindrical pavilions also light up further accentuating the facade add to the festive atmosphere of the space.
Market Square Events Venue
Ocean Lifestyle Club
Art Echo
An interaction with the historical building that reverberate the relationship of humans with the cycles.
250 Middle Road began as a special-diseases hospital and has evolved into an academy. Through the years, the building’s worth has plummeted. The structure is designed in an Art-Deco style with a simple geometric shape, and it is surrounded by institutions that dominate its contemporary values. I identified the site’s aspirations by understanding and studying the context and current Singapore Goals.
The analysis informed me to increase social and architectural value while also holding on to its institutional values to preserve the memory and spirit of the place. In addition, a future integrated cycle hub is identified, where the program can strengthen the building’s values in relation to its surroundings and play a critical role in the future. As shown in the diagram, a new heritage trail will be created along the Middle Road, connecting it with existing ones. In the former building, the cycling hub will have a Cycle Museum, and in the new addition, it will cater to cycle stores. People can also enroll in the e-sports cycle training institute, a 100-seat auditorium for international competitions. A rooftop restaurant will add value to the proposed program.
[ Additional Caption ]
Atul Garg (Y4S1)
Studio by Nikhil Joshi
CHAOSMOS
Chasomos is a project located at the coastal edge of Pasir Panjang and is inspired by the historic values of the site, which use to be the battle grounds during WWII in 1942 where allied forces fought against the Japanese for the possession of the ridge.
Through site investigations, the site currently lacks historic preservations of the battle of Pasir Panjang, with only one war museum located around the area. Therefore a design of a new memorial within the site is of importance to honour the historic value and legacy of the site.
The design features a floating memorial on the water’s surface with the aim to invoke a sensorial journey within the building, conjuring an experience of immense oppression similarly felt during the war by these soldiers. In contrast, the building also aims to furhter overwhelm users with a juxtaposing euphoric feeling of liberation as they transition out from their oppressed states, similarly felt when the war ended.
WWII Memorial Harry Lam (Y5S1)
Studio by Hans Brouwer
Wind Scenes
Prelude to Everyday Archi-facture
Studio by David Schafer
Nigel Chew (Y5S1)
Objects are usually defined by their function. A pen is for writing, a plastic bag for carrying things, a fan for a cool breeze.
Their potentials always lie beyond that, however.
I wonder about how, with a little orchestration, everyday objects can create interesting spaces at home.
Simple, yet unusual, ensembles of mundane things and the interactions between them.
A play with materials, light, sounds and wind, the behaviour and whims of the person inside a house and of the house itself.
I take a second look at the oscillating standing fan.
Oddly, it also periodically turns to look at me.
I present, Wind Scenes.
Video Playlist Link (Reverse Chronological)
Tactile Story
The Chinatown Story Teller
As one of Singapore’s oldest districts, Chinatown boasts many historic structures and artefacts that are handed down from generation to generation. Many pieces of architecture can be seen lining the streets of Chinatown, most of them hiding “precious treasures” within. Some shops even withstood the test of time, standing strong for as long as a hundred years. While it is great that there have been younger and fresher faces taking over the older generation, we must note that the tangible is easily bequeathed, but the intangible is so often lost forever. Tactile story imagines a possible future where its presence in the city would not only help Singaporeans reconnect with the past, but also create a new destination where people could see that People’s Park Complex houses more than just shops and places of service. Residents around the area could see it as a family destination, or a space where families could bring their kids to play, watch a show, or tell stories, while workers nearby would have a new place to relax, where its prominence on the rooftop breaks the skyline of regular and dull concrete and glass monotony.
[ The “New Performance” ]
Ow Yeong Jun Jie (Y5S1)
Studio by Gaurang Khemka
A House for Touchy-Feely People
Human dirt is the aggregate of all dirt, both external and internally produced by bodily functions. The assumption is that this dirt is indiscriminately omnipresent, to the extent that all surfaces our bodies contact with effectively map human dirt. Simplistically put, the dirt of interest is contact surfaces. Especially in this day and age where we’ve never been more sensitive about touching a lift button for fear of it being a medium for the dirt of another user to leap onto us, I would like to make a case for a house where everyone touches everyone through some surface or space, as some form of cognitive behavioral therapy. We’ve always lived with this sort of contact, what more between members of a family inhabiting the same apartment. My design intends to increase the frequency and intensity of human dirt about our domestic spaces, as well as spark moments of recognition of this often overlooked or unnoticed form of dirt.
[ Ground Floor Plan ]
Rebecca Chong (Y4S1)
Studio by Ong Ker Shing
This couch happens to be in a position where the inhabitants of this house aren’t able to observe it from their rooms. Hence, there’s no of knowing that where you rested your head was precisely on the spot where someone’s butt just was...
There is the occassional interfacing with foreign dirt, such as in the case of a passing breeze that is too invitingly cool to pass up.
Furniture rarely comes with a manual on how to use it, and some of us are more fidgety than others...
The shifting of the piano bench out forces inhabitants to veer closer to the dining table, in the process brushing their hands along the table for some form of support.
A 600mm high ledge doubles as seat, or an edge to lean on, as well as a table of sorts for both the dining and living areas between which it is located.
This step prompts people to search for physical supports to lean or grasp, creating a high touch intenstive regions, allowing for more dirt to be passed from one body to another. The ledge is also read as a seat, by a user leaving the house.
[ A preliminary mapping of human dirt about a household]
contact between bodies
contact with foreign dirt KEY
contact with one’s own body
ReCOnnect
Commune for the Young and Young-at-Heart
Ryan Neo (Y4S1)
ReCOnnect is a multi-generational, multi-accessible mixed-use community that draws on the master plan’s egalitarian principle of returning the land to its people. In reconnecting the oft hard-lined divide between the public/private realms typically found at the interfaces of buildings and their adjacencies, or where mandated setback requirements physically distance meaningful urban life from the street scape, a renewed intrinsic connection between people and the city is sought – one where the ground level, accessible 24/7, is returned to the public, where activities are brought closer to the very people who traverse the street scape, as well as where the synergies arising from serendipitous encounters and purposeful intergenerational interactions are harnessed and enjoyed.
Situated at the intersection of three important thoroughfares of FlexiCity, ReCOnnect melds each of their unique characters into seamless, yet layered, transitions from one destination to another. The variety of threshold spaces lining
View from the Green Network Across the Tram Loop
Studio by Prof. Ar. Richard Ho
publicly-accessible walkways around, through and within the architecture implicitly modulate the degree of public/private notions to further define the ground level (and thus fenceless) activity spaces. The upper storeys house the private domains of the residents, comprising flexible apartment layouts and communal spaces. The resultant contribution of the architecture to the urban experience is thus that of a public-activated ground level abound with convivial opportunities to co-mingle with people of all ages from all walks of life, yet at once with no compromise to the privacy of the residents above.
ReCOnnect, in seeking to renew meaningful connections between people, architecture and urban life, is thus poised to provide a socially equitable setting where close-knitted communities, bound neither by age nor provenance, thrive. It reconnects people to the forgotten joys of a non-segregated lifestyle, as well as a collective community spirit reminiscent of the kampungs of yesteryear.
The Giving Place
A Centralised Hub for The Local Freegan Community
Seetoh Hui Yi, Jeslyn (Y5S1)
Food waste is one of the biggest waste streams in Singapore, involving highly perishable items like fruits and vegetables. Similarly with material waste, it was discovered that local manufacturers have experienced problems of producing large quantities of leftovers during the manufacturing process. How then could we rethink and reuse these food and material waste in a more sustainable manner? The idea of freeganism is adopted, a lifestyle philosophy in which one rejects wasteful production, by foraging for and reusing otherwise discarded goods.
Located near Kranji Reservoir, The Giving Place aims to be a space that supports the freegan community in Singapore, and promotes sustainable food and material usage. Situated in between both agricultural and industrial areas, as well as nearby residential areas and nature reserves, the proposal acts as a centralized hub for the local freegan community, with programmes consisting of a collection center, free market, community kitchen, dining area and workshops.
Exploded Isometric
Studio by Marc Webb, Naoko Takenouchi
Expertising on their knowledge and know-hows, local manufacturers and craftsmen in the area are partnered with to construct the main structure of the buildings as well as interior furnishings. Spaces are carefully zoned in a circular manner, subtly encouraging informal and playful movement and flow. The circular form maximizes the views from each space out towards the view of the land and waterscapes of the reservoir and parks.
The building is constructed with materials that are repurposed and foraged from the surrounding site. Rattan baskets which once stored and help transport fruits and vegetables, are repurposed into rattan screens. Timber offcut pieces are repurposed into interior furniture and glulam walls, a type of engineered wood made by joining timber pieces to create a structurally sound material. Agricultural fabric mesh are repurposed into shading devices for the spaces.
Visualizations
First Storey Floor Plan
Devices, Détournements, Demonstrations
Studio by Constance Lau
Eugene Tan (Y4S1)
The project questions the rational, economic society of Singapore in the era of climate change. In a survey that I conducted, I found a disjunction between ownership of climate issues and ownership of Bukom, despite most participants acknowledging the negative effects of oil refining on climate change. I postulate this disjunction as a result of an underlying rationalist attitude and associations regarding ownership. “Bukom is owned by the corporation and thus it is their responsibility...” I wonder if such a rationalist attitude that draws clear lines for responsibility and ownership in the climate crisis might actually create less resilient societies. Thus, as opposed to efficiency-driven practices, or algorithmic optimisation approaches, I am arguing that the approach towards a more resilient society ought to be founded on ownership. To explore this, I sought to craft a new design methodology that explores design through the disjunction of unlikely ideas.
The project focuses on the disjunction between reading Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; or the modern Prometheus, and the site of Pulau Bukom, a 1.45km2 island located approximately 5km off the south coast of Singapore. The former, is often cited as the first science-fiction novel for its speculation on contemporary science-fiction. Shelley’s novel is commonly seen as a warning about ambitious scientific endeavors that lead to humanity’s ruin. In the era of climate change, oil refineries have been seen as a “monster”, responsible for the destruction of our environment. The parallels between Shelley’s novel and Bukom are seen by the destruction of home by a monster of our own doing. However, inspired by the moral ambiguity of the monster in Shelley’s novel, my starting point focused on looking beneath the surface of the hyper-productive and industrial façade of the
The final drawing is part design methodology, site analysis and architecture proposition; allowing the creative user the freedom to interpret the drawing in multiple ways.
site. When reviewing the international recognition and economic benefits that Bukom has brought to Singapore, I struggled with labelling it as a monster. The project further explores the existence of a domesticity that exists beneath the industrial, mechanical and hyperproductive façade of the island.
Through this project, I will reveal that the definition of home shifts and transforms, it is found through research on the past, as a design methodology, but more importantly, the existence of the home on Bukom raises the most important question: whom should we be designing Bukom for?
Reframing the polyphony of home on Pulau Bukom through an ecotechnological reading of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818).
The portfolio depicts the process involved in creating the final drawing, which illustrates the polyphonic process of design.
The Sanctuary.
To Propogate, Educate and Make.
Teng Fang Hui (Y4S1)
Collectively as a studio, Bras Basah had been repurposed into a testing site that restores ecology (i.e. water, flora and fauna, animals). In a way, the site becomes one that supports land ethic, valuing all forms of life on Earth.
To Propogate;
The intervention focuses on conserving 3 types of endangered specties: the Sunda Pangolins, Asian Softshell Turtles and the Malayan Colugos. It provides ecological spaces in the urban environment that provides care for these species, allowing them to propagate safely before releasing them back into the wild, repopulating the ecosystem.
To Educate;
Since not many had even known the existence of these species, the intervention externalises the behavioural process of these endangered species, providing
Sectional Perspective 01
Studio by Teh Joo Heng
educational values for the public to learn more aboout them through an intimate and artistic context, even if it is as simple as moving around within their habitats, while maintaining healthy boundaries.
To Make;
Given that Bras Basah is a well-known arts district, the project aims to restore the diluted arts scene in this precinct by connecting the NAFA Campuses. Shaped like a 3-legged octopus, the central capsule houses the naturally ventilated studios and makerspaces, which branches out to bridge the NAFA campuses together, while interweaving into the animals habitats, while working with the new masterplan designed as a studio.
These bridging, transitionary spaces serves as gallery walks that showcases students’ works, or potentially being used as seasonal exhibition or pop up spaces for larger scale installations.
Interior Renders
Sectional Perspective 02
Second Storey Plan (Art Studios, Makerspaces and Event Spaces)
Creative Factory Mall
A Productive Leisure Hub
The Creative Factory Mall is a microsm of an abstracted supply chain of the consumer society. The project adopts the much lauded concept of mixing work and play which appears to exist on separate ends of the abstracted supply chain of the consumer society. However, the project gives further weight to the usual “Back of house”, logistic functions, which is of great importance in bringing intermediate goods from producer to producer and finished goods from producer to consumer. The architecture reveals the inner workings of this flow of products - intermediary or finished within the different functions of the building. The project also incoporates experiential and lifestyle offerings in an attempt to ensure greater viability to the such a project.
Zhu Shengbuwei (Y5S1)
Studio by Raymond Hoe
CHRISTOPHER CHUA YAN JUNNY | KOH ZHE WEI
Molly’s Gold
FANG SIYI | HUI LO WAN
The Community Gateway
MARSHA ISMAIL | TSENG KAR LEONG TIFFANIE
Barite Jahaj
MUHAMMAD SYAFIQ BIN MUHAMAD AYYOOB | QUAN WEIYI, CYNTHIA
Three Unusual Buildings
DELA CRUZ JOHN ANTHONY | VALENTINA CORONA
Hidden Saigon
KOH DAI YUAN, SHOKI
Yuragi healing centre
LYU MENGJIE
Meditative Mall
B.ARCH FOUR SEMESTER TWO
NATALIE MOK
Bed Bastard
TAY YU JIE KENNETH
phyllotaxis
REBECCA CHONG SHU WEN
Takeaway, Toilet Breaks and One Very Persistent Cat
YE THU
Holding Space
WAN ZHI KAI
The Zeitgeist
HAN JIAJUN ADRIAN
Bauen & The Urban Crypt of Werdersche Markt
LU KAIYU
What if Milton Keynes grew from planting trees?
Cube100
MUHAMMAD ISMAILL BIN AZMAN
Molly’s Gold
A
tale of bad faith
Christopher
Studio by Thomas Kong
Chua (Y4S2)
Koh Zhe Wei (Y4S2)
“Home is where the heart is”, a proverb coined by JT Bickford in his book “Scandal” 1857, often referring to the timeless nature of home being surrounded by loved ones and warm memories. Home can then be said to be the foundation of love, comfort, trust and security.
In times of desperation and hardship, the role of the home nonetheless serves its purpose in reflecting the changing priorities of its users. We believe that the last home serves to lay bare the truth of the heart, revealing hints of the conflict between the altruistic aspirations of mankind and the deviant inclinations of the heart.
Molly’s Gold tells a story of confronting adversity by her tale of survival in a world that has been destroyed by those she relies on. Humanity’s mistakes are Molly’s consequences; the actions taken by humans resulted in the desolate world that Molly now lives in. This story showcases two sides of humanity: First, the ingenuity and innovation of humanity in creating a self-sustaining underground world. Second, a species captured by greed and addiction which leads to death and destruction of the world they have every reason to cherish.
The Community Gateway
Biophilic Healing Rehabilitation Centre
Studio by Shinya Okuda
Hui Lo Wan Peggy (Y4S2)
Fang Siyi (Y4S2)
The Community Gateway is a wellness-focused development offering an array of clinical services including outpatient and specialized rehabilitation centres, and public amenities such as community cafe and childcare centre. Encapsulated by its natural surroundings, the project has the potential to serve patients within the immediate and wider neighborhood while developing into a common gathering spot for relaxation, rehabilitation and refuge purposes. The project proposes to complete the urban fabric, signifying as a gateway to unite the ‘urban’ with the ‘natural’. A key site response strategy is with the adoption of a curvature axis, derived from the corridor route, to inform the base structural form. The added gesture of a central green atrium piercing the building reflects on a grand gateway entrance. Viewed as an attraction in its own right, the lush green void invites visitors to seamlessly flow through the layers of the site. As a sign of embracing natural elements, rain rivers down the sloping roof and forms a water barrier around the garden, alleviating the gloomy tropical rain experience. The airy rooftop deck offers open, multipurpose refuge spaces, sheltered from harsh lighting conditions. The circular-radial strategy ensembles a sense of community, inclusive of recovery patients, healthcare workers and public users. The dramatic yet elegant, concaved and green atrium portrays the significance of the building beyond simply that of a rehabilitation centre.
CHILDCARE
2
3 CLINICAL ADMINISTRATION & SUPPORT PUBLIC AMENITIES
The short film Barite Jahaj (Bengali for “Home Ship”) is set in 2077 Chittagong, Bangladesh. Slipping between the real and the imagined, Barite Jahaj is a speculative urbanism and a fictional narrative of one finding acceptance in a harsh world. Barite Jahaj is an exaggerated version of the present, and an imagined world where we can project new models of how technology and culture may transcend together.
A large corporation has taken over the ship breaking industry in this future world. Small dwelling units intermixed with shops and services are stacked vertically with the industrial infrastructure to form a megastructure housing thousands of inhabitants, many who depend on the corporation for work and survival. The town is now opportunistic, tacky, money making, torn between cultural values.
The story follows the journey of a Bangladeshi shipbreaker who struggles to be accepted socially after being fitted with a prosthesis arm. Despite his sense of isolation, he finds joy making hybrid kites for the children. As Aarish questions his reality, the relationship between technology, culture and the sacred body surfaces. He decides to take matters into his own hands, exploring the meaning of cultural prosthetics.
Barite Jahaj - Architectural TypologyX
Tseng Kar Leong Tiffanie (Y4S2)
Marsya Alwani Binte Ismail (Y4S2)
Studio by Thomas Kong
3 Unusual Buildings
An architecture of sampling
Syafiq Ayyoob (Y4S2)
Cynthia Quan (Y4S2)
This project is a collaboration between a local student and an exchange student from Taiwan. The project is interested in the ornamentation and poetic expression of modernist elements found in the architecture of a select group of post-war midcentury modernist Vietnamese architects. Often these ornaments are found to express and clarify ideas of form and composition rather than for performative reasons. We were intrigued by the eccentricity found in the ornamentation of a select group of buildings, which we saw as a reflection of the dynamic urban experience of Ho Chi Minh.
Continuing from the formal reading of the existing VVK building as a podium with a T-shaped object on top, we extended the podium as a base for the new objects to sit on. The strategy of the addition to the existing VVK building is through aggregation of new objects strategically positioned for formal and performative reasons. Through basic formal operations such as rotation and
Perspective from street
Studio by Erik L’Heureux
interlocking, the new additions are differentiated from the existing building. We liked the idea that these objects could have their own personalities and formally be read as different objects that sat on a podium. The object that defies the main axis is given a rougher treatment with sharp and crisp edges, while the other two objects are given a softer treatment through scallops and curves. Sampling from modernist architecture elements and giving them a playful and expressive twist with experimentation of color, the project is an artistic and intellectual experimentation with composition of form and basic architectural elements - which in the tropics include elements that mitigate the mediums of Hot Air such as brisesoleil, hooded windows, breeze blocks and so on. Questions of color and how to use color performatively and atmospherically also plays itself into the architecture, creating an overall playfulcomposition of objects within the dominantly concrete urban fabric.
Worm’s Eye Axonometric
Ornamentation and style of hot air elements
Hidden Saigon
V.A.R
building, HCMC, Vietnam
Studio by Erik G L’Heureux
Anthony Dela Cruz (Y4S2) Valentina Corona (Exchange)
The new addition serves as a “panama hat” to the V.A.R that enhances the interior conditions of the existing and operationally saves carbon in the long run. A structural platform sits above the top level of V.A.R presenting a tabula rasa. Higher levels boast better microclimate with open views towards the river; a safe haven, free from the constant droning of motorbikes, dust and the chaos of HCMC. This new environment was the perfect opportunity to create a secondary ground floor, a plaza that serves as an extension of the life on the ground floor for people to gather, away from Ho Chi Minh’s notorious traffic congestion. Hidden Saigon is a climatic device, functioning as the heart of District 1 community.
The upper blocks built on the structural platform emulates the characteristics of the existing row houses of HCMC. In an effort to capture the granularity of the city, the blocks vary in height based on solar radiation analysis. Each block consist of parallel walls that sample the row houses but with a twist. To add greater dynamics to the sampling of the city, the walls themselves are bent to funnel the prevailing wind coming from the south to produce a venturi effect. This will in turn create a negative air pressure that will suck out air from the existing V.A.R and facilitate passive natural ventilation and cool the interior spaces.
YURAGI HEALING CENTRE
Extension to Alexandra Hospital
The project based on the concept of biophillia; where environments which establishes stronger connection between the users and nature can induce greater productivity and accelerated recovery in humans. The project aims to serve its users through an immersive experience and series of biophillic-driven conditions.
Natural light is a critical component in circadian rhythm which aids the body to function at its peak capacity and productivity. This drives the design to open itself up through a series of carved gestures at multiple scales, to manipulate how light pours into spaces. At the macro level, the splitting of site lengthwise allows daylight to pour into the deeper levels and onto the inner facades. The canyoninspired corridors allows users pop in and out of the major blocks to peek into the light-filled cracks of the building form where they tap into the rhythmic hues of natural light. These corridors are aligned to the axis of equatorial sun path that garners seasonal shifts in orientation and angles for the users to experience.
Birds Eye View
Shoki Koh (Y4S2)
Studio by Shinya Okuda
Exploded Axonometric // View from Green Roof // Section // View from Green Pocket
Meditative Mall
Singapore’s Little Myanmar Bastard
Mengjie Lyu (Y4S2)
The project begins with a research of Peninsula Plaza and the St. Andrew Cathedral opposite it. According to the analysis, Singapore undertakes different religions from different countries, resulting in a unique style - that is, Burmese Buddhists live under the outer skin with Gothic architectural elements.
In the research, I found that the “great-grandfather” Salisbury Cathedral was Bastardized by the tropical culture (S.E.A. Singapore), got “grandfather” St Andrew Cathedral, and further got “father” Peninsula Plaza. And Yangon’s “great-grandmother” Shwedagon Pagoda came to Singapore and Bastard turned into Burmese Buddhist Temple, and Burmese would enshrine Bastard Burmese Buddhist Temple in their shops, which is “Buddhist ALTARS” in Peninsula Shops. And this project is designed from the perspective of combining “father” Peninsula Plaza and “mother” Buddhist ALTARS in Peninsula Plaza Shops.
[ Perspective of the Meditation hall ]
Studio by Chatpong Chuerudeemol
Because Buddhism is a very daily and essential element in Burmese life, it is as vital as their grocery shopping. Therefore, in the original bustling market, if Burmese temples, Burmese monks, and meditation spaces in the mall, Burmese people who do not have time to go to Burmese temples in Singapore can buy vegetables and visit the Burmese temples they were supposed to visit every day at the same time.
A Chinese verse says: the “lesser hermit” lives in seclusion in the country, the “greater hermit” does so in the city”. This is to say that a leisurely and unrestrained life does not have to be experienced by going to Linquan Wilderness Path. A higher level of seclusion life is in the midst of the bustling city, where one can find peace of mind alone in the pure land of the soul.
[ Peninsula Plaza Altars and Burmese Buddhist Temple in Singapore ]
Bed Bastard
WHAT DO THEY DESERVE?
Natalie Mok (Y4S2)
PRIVACY {against sound/noise; option to control}
SPACE {at least more than a bed footprint}
SECURITY {personal controlled access}
ACCESS {to the outside, both physical and visual}
The recent pandemic brought light to the overcrowding and sanitary issues in construction workers dormitories in Singapore - a total of approximately 50. It is clear that these dormitories are top down regulated, built by developers, controlled by the government.
Bastardizing the Bastard - Isometric
[While the overall building plan was retained, the room plans were altered to addrress the existing overcrowding issues]
[The kitchen and dining area faces the courtyard, where workers can cook and eat as a community along the corridor - to heighten the communal aspect and allow natural ventilation]
Studio by Chatpong Chuenrudeemol
IDENTIFYING THE BASTARD
This research-based project first documents how the construction workers adapt their current building and beds to satisfy unfulfilled needs. The initial objective was to recreate the unclean and stifling nature of the dormitory - focusing on the bunk beds and laundry – to record in detail where life is allowed to take over the space and at an object level. By studying dormitory conditions through photos obtained from various sources, it reveals the depth of the fundamental building to understand their situation better. [Scan QR code to view research and process]
BASTARDIZING THE BASTARD
The research led to the ‘bastardization’ of the workers dormitory, where the DNA of the current building was identified and retained. The project aims to tackle the problems the workers currently face and to ‘free’ them - as in to offer them more comfortable and humane living conditions. More importantly, it is to address the question - what do they deserve?
Bastardizing the Bastard - Perspectives & Part Plans
[Each worker is allocated a unit each, where they have their own storage space, views to the outside, and the option to social interact and participate in communal activities within the room]
Original bed + Belongings [Bastard]
Hybrid ‘bed’ [Bastardizing the Bastard]
New Construction [Light gauge steel frame]
Section A-A
Section B-B
Takeaways, Toilet
Breaks and One Very Persistent Cat
Rebecca Chong Shu Wen (Y4S2)
A computer screen is flat, and yet paradoxically spatial. There appears to be a degree of magnification about the computer, holding our attention for a majority of our waking hours, and keeping us sufficiently satisfied without having to leave the 500mm radius of our chair and desk. Workspaces, sources of social stimulation, entertainment, are all instant and accessible, nothing but a reflexive wrist flick of a mouse or a keyboard entry away. A computer UI tells us everything and anything instantly, with constant stimuli signalling the gaps in our information.
Even though this 4-room HDB flat offers 105m2 of space, its inhabitants, a workfrom-home architectural assistant and a gamer/streamer, spend most of their waking hours within the 500mm radius of their computers. In this safe space of 0.78m2, the digital spaces offer more than just convenience, but as well as control, social stimulation, and surety.
[reworked flat, please refer to the boards and process booklet for the full image]
Studio by Lilian Chee
Reality pales in comparison as it appears unchanging, or even daunting; there isn’t an overworld notification system that tells us when the sun is starting to set, or what’s the next task in the main quest of life; and the extent of reality which we are willing to navigate decreases. Conversely, with how easy and straightforward it is to navigate the digital realm, where the “next task” is highlighted in bright red against a dominantly cool toned interface and a wrist flick away from tending to, the world from the computer desk grows smaller and more accessible with each software update or hardware upgrade. With more of our lives being converted to a digital existence, such that we become digital workers, this project seeks to develop a representation of the digital space in order to understand its hold over us. This research concludes in a design that productively disrupts virtual time and space using natural, nature-bound, or spontaneous occurrences, thus also challenging conventions surrounding interior-exterior boundaries.
[sketches that helped me conceptualise a design intervention, more can be found in the process booklet]
[original spaces lived in for the work-from-home architectural assistant, please refer to the boards and process booklet for the full image]
phyllotaxis.
Located in the Jurong planning area, the site sits between two major planning zones; Jurong Innovation District (JID) and Jurong Lake District (JLD), hence, the project aims to bridge the two planning developments and provide a more cohesive urbanization program in Jurong. Firstly, the building serves as a library to the many educational institutions and residents in its vicinity, and also as a research center, adding to the other R&D facilities in JID. Secondly, with Jurong Lake Gardens — Singapore’s newest national gardens, located directly across the site, I wanted the program and design to be informed by it. Therefore, the building serves as a library and research center dedicated to botanical and horticultural sciences. The concept, “phyllotaxis”, derived from plants, is the arrangement of leaves in specific patterns on the stem of a plant. The building volumes are arranged according to the patterns of phyllotaxy, where the programs are located in and on top of the “leaves”, and the “stem” serves as the core and main vertical circulation of the building.
Tay Yu Jie Kenneth (Y4S2)
Studio by François Blanciak
Holding Space
Representing the Domestic
In investigating the subject of seeing and being seen, the architectural drawings initially made were meant to discover some form of architectural intervention. Yet, the gaps they produced led to the project itself. The short film is sited in a series of domestic interiors, focusing on the reproductive labour of making home by Burmese immigrant residents. Through film, I wish to capture what has eluded my exercises in architectural representation – views of the interior seen from the outside, and as they are perceived by the residents from the interior. The home-space of the HDB flat as lived and experienced by a minority immigrant exists as much through this imagined gaze as it does through actual reality. The way the project is filmed departs from the conventions of how architecture is viewed and imbued with meaning – through the all-seeing plans, elevations, sections and perspective drawings. The making of the film and the capturing of these imagined views challenge both the integrity and usefulness of architecture’s often assumed and unremarked ways of seeing.
Ye Thu (Y4S2)
Studio by Lilian Chee
[ Additional Caption ]
The Zeitgeist
Expanding Boundaries; Drawing Relevance
The project revisits the controversy of Bauakademie’s reconstruction, critiquing the German Bundestag motto for the project “As much Schinkel as possible” which refers to a highly irrelevant 19th-century late Schinkel’s portrayal. From the perspectives of cost, labour, and functionality in this modern era, a faithful reconstruction of the Bauakademie will ignore the site’s rich frontages, depreciate the building’s potential by having a fortress-like form, and most importantly, entrap Berliners within merely a fragment of the land’s rich history.
The author’s proposal argues that the next representation of the Bauakademie should refer to the spirit of the building during its conception, which itself intrinsically timeless. Schinkel’s Bauakademie portrays a concept of modern self-perception and its ability to distinguish invention as a sign of freedom and artistic imagination. Sublation of historical forms to synthesise novelty in architectural tectonic representation, a pioneering sign of modernism.
Wan Zhi Kai (Y4S2)
City as a Campusrelevance
Studio by Rene Tan
Schinkel’s democratised architecture school with the insertion of public programs on the ground floor and related governing bodies on the third and fourth floor of the original Bauakademie suggests the thesis statement of the author’s proposal. A liberated learning environment that uses the strategic placement of programs to draw an influx of crowds around the site into the main space (studio spaces). Serendipity converges within this urban nexus, relating back to the spirit of the Bauakademie.
“Every work of art, must contain a new element, that lends a true and necessary tension (from the past).”
-K.F.Schinkel.
Interplay between outdoors and indoors as advocated by Schinkel
Site plan
Hanging libraries decorate a porous studio space upon entrance
What if Milton Keynes Grew from Planting Trees?
A prototype development on how nature and weather can be perpetual resources
Idiosyncrasy of modernism is the lack of human nuance and engagement with nature in its relentless pursuit of high efficiency and equality to replace everyday practice.
Project inspiration comes from Jacques Tati’s movie, “Playtime”, the move is a set in a futuristic Paris dominated by a hyper consumerist modernism. Instead of current built environment, how nature and the weather can be perpetual resources, and what if we are given a second chance to reconfigure our priorities of our cities?
What if Milton Keynes grew from planting trees? A prototype development on how nature and weather can be perpetual resouces.
New Milton Keynes’ plots was defined as evolving plots and agroforestry plots.
Lu Kaiyu (Y4S2)
Tree Caring Centre
Studio by Prof. CJ LIM
Apple Cider Community / Town Centre
Through the precise strategies of intercropping and harvesting woods from tree planting plots, each evolving plot contains the community spirits and require no unsustainable construction materials. This project will be funded by Milton Keynes Local Council, replace original masterplan development from 1960s.
The project looks back in time, setting the timeline to 1955. Before the first masterplan of Milton Keynes purchased by the local council. Instead of building a modernist city oriented by car and concrete, I and mayor - Melvin Webber replace it with a masterplan starting from growing trees. Whole Milton Keynes’ plots was defined as evolving plots and planting plots. Through the precise strategies of intercropping and harvesting woods from tree planting plots, each evolving plot contains the community spirits and require no unsustainable construction materials.
Bauen & The Urban Crypt of Werdersche Markt
01 Bauen is an architecture school proposed in response to a brief that asked for the reconstruction of Schinkel’s (demolished) Bauakademie in Berlin. Sited at the opportune intersection between Berlin’s Museum Island, Unter der Linden, Werdersche Markt, and Schinkelplatz, the scheme attempts to introduce the public into the oft-private and privatised activity of architectural education. Acting as a counterbalance to the barrage of imagery afforded from the liberalised access to “polished” architectural content via social media, Bauen reinstates the process-driven nature of architectural education; It invites the public domain to enjoy, immerse and involve themselves in the literal and material space in which architecture and architectural discourse is being produced.
02 The Urban Crypt of Werdersche Markt is an intervention made upon the Friedrichwerdersche Kirche, designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel. Incurring significant damage during World War II, the church has been restored and adaptively reused as a museum today. The intervention, which introduces a sunken plaza into the Werdsche Markt that foregrounds the church, defines a public space that doubles as a waiting area during the operational hours of the museum. This responds to the high visitorship that the museum had witnessed since its opening in 2020, in spite of the pandemic. During nonoperational hours, the amphitheatre-like space accomodates Berliners from all walks of life.
Sunken Court in Werdersche Markt
Han Jiajun Adrian (Y4S2)
Studio by Rene Tan
Internal Courtyard in Bauen
Bauen, Exploded Axonometric
The Urban Crypt of Werdersche Markt, Exploded Axonometric
Cube100
a cities of HDB
Is’maill Azman (Y4S2)
Cube100 is a prototype housing project that aims to improve the quality of public housing. There is always a shift in housing quality between the public and private sectors. One might assume that the private sector is better in every way. Cube100 hopes to dispel this impression and reintroduce public housing in Singapore with the facilities and flexibility of private housing. While retaining the qualities of the existing HDB, CUBE100 in some ways revitalizes the Singapore way of life.
With a site area of 100 x 100 x 100 in a volumetric sense, CUBE100 represents an unprecedented scale of residential space in Singapore.
The use of PPVC allows the creation of a variety of housing types using the current footprint of the different room types of HDB. With three different types, namely single, double and triple height, users can live in a public housing complex in different ways. The different types allow a variety of staging inside and outside the apartments, creating a new interaction and life.
CUBE100 functions as a city unto itself, supported by frameworks and programs that promote well-being, safety, and togetherness, manifesting as a symbol of inclusivity, flexibility, and affordability.
Sectional Obligue of Tower A
Studio by Francios Blanciak
The two modules dealing with the design research thesis have been put together to allow students to develop a high level of competence in creative practice design research; this competence would then lead to architectural outcomes in a wide range of topics.
Building on the (AR5806) Architectural Design Research Report, the Architectural Design Thesis will drive the students to take a critical position of their research and hypothesis, where the progression of the exploration throughout the semester will lead to the manifestation of an architectural proposition.
Students are encouraged to extend the research programme from Semester 1 through to Semester 2, translating and transforming a research topic and hypothesis into design outcomes.
Deliverables include all necessary drawings, models, photos, films that represent the research and Expansion of Thesis prep report as an A4 Portrait document, illustrating and describing the research outcomes in Semester 2.
design research thesis
ALMAS AZMAN
Kampung De-Carbon | Cheng Yan Court
ANG HUI YING
Navigating (Un)familiar Grounds
BRYAN MAH CHEE CHEW
A Solar Storey
CHOOI CHUEN WAI KEEFE
The Great Cornucopia of the Golden Mile
CHING YU HAN
Museum of Everyday Life
CLARENCE CREDENSA TAN
Neo Rochor
DE SOUZA JOSHUA ANDREW
An Elevated Future
KOH KHIA TONG
Double D’s: Demolition Demolished
LEONG LIN CHIN
Antifragility and its Architectural
Implications
MOK SHI QI, ANDY
Singapore as The Farm City
HU HUIYAO
Houses on the Cloud
LAI WEI SONG
Heartland Cracks; Kukoh Transpires
LIN YINGYING
New Urban Village
ONG XIN YEE, ELAINA
E2SPORTS: ECO ESPORTS
SARAH WONG SI MIN
2050 Conscious City
SENG PEI EN, JOANNE
Circular Consciousness
TAN YEN RONG ASTORIA ISABEL
Claiming Ground: Future Urban Agriculture and the Architectures of Cultivation
WU LINGYI
Towards Independence
ZHENG RENJIE
Clumsy Architecture for Wicked Urban Problems
IAN TAY ZHE JUN
Shell’s Down | Power’s Up
SEETOH HUI YI, JESLYN
The New Normal of Muara Gembong
SHARMAINE LEE PUI FONG
Refreshing POPS
TAN XUAN
An Approach to Multi-species Architecture
ZHANG RUIJIA
The Wildlife City
ZUO YUCHEN
The Moving Market
Kampung De-Carbon | Cheng
Yan Court
Application of a Decarbonisation Lifestyle in Cheng
Yan Court
Studio by Teh Joo Heng
Almas Azman (Y5S2)
As numerous cities advance towards the reduction of carbon emissions and greenhouse gasses, there have been emergence of plans to mitigate energy production, waste and recycling, retrofitting of buildings, and so on and so forth. Many of the efforts taken consist of small scale remedies, applied to a scattershot of build ings, or need to clear large empty plots of land for ground zero. Considering the land- scarce and natural resource limited city of Singapore, the problem becomes accentuated and we are in the constant search of finding solutions to revamp the surrounding environment.
SoftSystems:ActivitiesforDwellers
In the era of pressing climate change and innovation, indubitably, we need to search for ways to decarbonize our environment and the way we live- of which includes looking to the cities we live in. Decarbonisation is the process applied to the built infrastructure in order to reduce carbon emissions produced from the built environment and activities in the built environment. If we were to take the existing built environment as a resource, how would we use architectural design to reconstruct and add current infrastructure alongside the way we live in the city? Where would architecture stand in the decarbonisation of our urban fabric?
In a building-saturated and land-scarce context such as Singapore, this thesis aims to introduce a series of systems to improve the living conditions of the environment by decarbonisation, while maintaining the vitality of the urban core.
Navigating (Un)familiar Grounds
The Sense of Order within Complexity
Ang Hui Ying (Y5S2)
This investigation on wayfinding within Future Urban Neighbourhoods explores Pallasmaa’s call for the return of locus of perception to the human body. Largely guided by the late Christopher Alexander’s 15 Principles of Order, the phenomenology of wholeness is used to create a rhizomatic masterplan focused on developing a deep cognitive reserve in residents through adopting a relational worldview.
The wayfinding experience of 2020 relies heavily on secondary information systems like signage and navigational tools. The lived experience of 2050 will expand to include complex environments and interactions with multiple agents. Without developed deep cognitive abilities, residents will find it difficult to recognise forms and position themselves within high-rise high-density environments while making sense of multiple exchanges.
rhizomatic structure supporting activities at various elevations
Studio by Fung John Chye
In Nature of Order, Alexander posits that the human feeling of wholeness is all the same and puts forth 15 principles of strong centres. This project seeks to de-emphasise the current vision-heavy worldview to bring importance to lived experiences and the sense of presence. The development of a holistic perception will cultivate a deep cognitive reserve that will serve residents well, should they be afflicted by cognitive impairment, such as dementia, in old age.
The site selected for the complex neighbourhood is the north of Paya Lebar Air Base, where there are plans for the decommissioned airbase to be geofenced as a sandbox estate. A rhizomatic system was adopted for possibilities of nonhierarchical expansion, where spaces can grow and expand according to what users deem fit at any point in time. The site provides various environments from wetlands to greenery to urban for residents to navigate and impart meaning to.
complex neighbourhood with wayfinding marks
A SOLAR STOREY
A Multi-Systemic Rethinking of Tuas Mega Port
Studio by Nirmal Tulsidas Kishnani (Dr)
Bryan Mah Chee Chew (Y5S2)
As Singapore only contributes to 0.1% of global emissions, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced in 2009 that Singapore cannot “volunteer to take drastic measures to reduce emissions… at the cost of our economy. However, despite Singapore’s initial announcements on its conservative stance towards climate protection, environmental innovations are continually made which springboard Singapore on the global arena for climate progress. For instance, Singapore’s multi-agency initiative of the world’s largest floating solar panel farm, comprising 122,000 panels on Tengeh Reservoir. Along with efforts to harness additional solar energy from building rooftops and MRT tracks, Singapore has essentially begun to challenge the notion of monofunctional, monocentric land use, to maximise its limited land area by rethinking space as an ensemble of complementary systems.
Therefore, this thesis proposes a viable strategy for the Tuas Mega Port, as an alternative for energy and economics for Singapore’s transition into a post-oil future. As Singapore has shown time and again how its geographical advantage and multi-systemic thinking can allow even a country as small as itself to make a difference in climate change, through the example of the Tuas Mega Port which considers aspects of renewable energy, economic productivity and vibrant liveability, this project further encourages future cities to be rethought for multi-disciplinary contributions.
Museum of Everyday Life
Studio by A/P Thomas Kong
Ching Yu Han (Y5S2)
The thesis investigates the making of a distributed museum of our everyday life. The thesis adopts the spirit of relational aesthetics, a contemporary art form which brings its theoretical horizon beyond the independent, private, and symbolic space of a museum or gallery, focussing on the human relations and their social contexts.
Against the backdrop of Singapore’s ageing population, the thesis asks how can the museum play a social mission in allowing the elderly of Chai Chee to age in place? In addition, how can the museum’s collection contribute to this mission? As such, the thesis’ museum departs from the setting of an institutionalised museum e.g national museums and private galleries. Instead, it approaches its collection, curation and design through a bottom-up and multiscalar approach.
The thesis has devised a three-fold exploration through relational ideals- the board game Housing Curiosities as a participatory sitesurveying method in engaging the community to discover hidden spatial meanings and relationships at the site, a series of Everyday Structures to house the collection of objects and the Museum of Everyday Life for a larger collection that would have accumulated over the years. Moreover, the project was awarded ‘Honorable Mention’ in the international competition ‘Tactical Urbanism’ in 2022.
Housing Curiosities
The thesis entails a three-fold exploration through relational ideals.
The Great Cornucopia of the Golden Mile
In response to the conservation of the Golden Mile Complex, The Golden Mile District and the Golden Mile Tower are adaptively reused and reimagined into an alternative downtown in contrast to Singapore’s uniformed global landscape, and a cultural playground for the unique transient migrant and subcultural communities and activities that reside in the district.
To celebrate and proliferate these them, a series of lightweight steel parasitic structures attach and extend from the spatial anchors of the Tower to create a series of additive spaces that allow for change over time. The new spaces are re-aggregated into the following programmatic anchors: Discotheque, Subcultural Hub, Market, Community Hub, Creative Hub and Heritage Hotel. These create a new series of spaces for all, including the transient migrants and subcultures, can negotiate their identities, strengthening the character of the Tower and the district, establishing a new cultural cornucopia into the future.
Keefe Chooi (Y5S2)
Studio by Swinal Samant Ravindranath
Neo Rochor
E-Waste 4.0
Studio by Cheah Kok Ming
Clarence Credensa Tan (Y5S2)
The thesis proposes an upstream circular network in Rochor that harnesses resources found in e-waste, in tandem with value creation, innovation and capacity building in the urban fabric. Urban mining repurposes existing infrastructure and grooms talent through e-entertainment, nurturing future ready innovators capable of making an impact in the e-waste ecosystem.
Presented in two parts, Salvager, serves as a first touch point for e-waste resuscitation through the adaptive reuse of surplus carpark spaces in Rochor. Redistribution markets and Repair Labs give used devices a second chance before obsolescence, while providing repair workshops that engage the community. Microfactories process, recover and transport components from dead tech to Elchemist as mobile spare parts for innovators, hackers and creatives.
A rebooted Sim Lim Square sets a new e-entertainment destination in the region, harnessing e-waste as an opportunity for innovation while capitalising a rapidly growing e-entertainment market. A series of activity centres oversees the rebirth of parts as “prosthetics”, repurposed as fresh hacks. From race drones, to robot gladiators, e-waste transforms liability to opportunity. An empowered maker is a transformed consumer. Moreover, it nurtures an ethics of resource sustenance. An upstream network unlocks new economies and collaboration towards a new circular era.
[ Elchemist; Sim Lim Square Rebooted]
An Elevated Future
This thesis explores how the typology of a skyscraper can be redesigned predominantly for public use with 24/7 accessibility to public spaces, amenities and transport. Through the establishment of clusters and ground planes, the scale of the skyscraper is pared back with the use of landscaping and nature further enhancing the user experience within the spaces.
Strategies to establish street life within each cluster was also explored. Taking the site and surroundings into consideration, the architecture of the skyscraper seeks to integrate and respond to the context of the site through complimentary programming, aesthetics and connectivity. Its location above Labrador Park MRT Station also allowed for the opportunity to integrate the existing Mass Rapid Transit System with future Mass Air Transportation.
Set in 2040 Singapore, An Elevated Future explores and speculates what potential possibilities Mass Urban Air Mobility (UAM) can bring for both passenger travel and logistics. The project rethinks the typology of the skyscraper and examines how the integration of UAM drones can benefit brick and mortar businesses and the public. It also delves into the idea of shifting ground planes and entry points with air travel becoming part of mass public transportation.
Labrador Drone Hub | Singapore 2040
Joshua Andrew De Souza (Y5S2)
Studio by Richard Ho Kong Fatt
HOUSES ON THE CLOUD
A Web Application Based on A Modular Prefab Construction System
Studio by Patrick Janssen
Hu Huiyao (Y5S2)
Houses on the Cloud is a web-based residential participatory design platform scripted using JavaScript (3JS Library), CSS and HTML. The app prototype is supported by a theoretical construction system of prefabricated modules that allows customisation of both the interior and exterior configurations of the apartment by the residents continuously over the lifetime of the building.
Despite significant shifts in values and family compositions of the new generations in some now developed Asian nations, most modernday high-rise residences still share the same legacy layouts, designed for ideal nuclear families with regular work life patterns. The proposed participatory design framework explores alternative visions of adaptable housing solutions to overcome the issues of homogeneity and limited variability. It is enabled by the open building concept: the support being a concrete frame in which apartments are inserted as infills. The web application is designed using a gamified approach, making it easy for non-designers to create 3D models of their apartments.
The proposal challenges the concept of a building: it is no longer a static entity, but instead a dynamic process that will undergo continuous adaptation through participatory design. The role of an architect focuses more on being a designer of spatial rules rather than the designer of a final spatial form.
Double D’S:
Demolition Demolished
Extending HDB’s Longevity without Demolition: The Addition & Subtraction on Existing Carbon Form
There is a rise in contemporary requirements for environmentally and socio-culturally sustainable developments. Buildings built in Singapore during the 1950-1980s are coming to an end of their lives today. The conventional decision of upgrading and redevelopment of the site would be the demolition of pre-existing buildings and to build new. However, there are exiting methods such as adaptive reuse to reconsider demolition of existing carbon form — to reduce carbon output and extend the life of existing structures. In Singapore, residential flats are rarely considered for adaptive reuse due to their mono-functional design and more often than not, they are demolished. Thus the paper suggests considering the adaptive reuse of Housing Development Board (HDB) flats as a type. The research involves 31 HDB flats situated along Tanglin Halt Estate that are earmarked for Selective En-Bloc Redevelopment Scheme (SERS). The project examines the various potential of adaptive reuse methods to the 31 existing blocks — through a series of addition and subtraction of old and new elements.
The focus is to reconsider how the state renews and redevelop an older plot of land and its existing buildings. Due to the volume of available built form in Tanglin Halt Estate and its historic significance to Singapore, it poses an opportunity for the implementation of adaptive reuse.
The project research interrogates the possibilities of addition above HDB rooftops and the subtraction of internal non-load bearing elements in the existing blocks. The consideration of using mass engineered timber (MET) as a construction element because of its structural strength and its capability as a carbon sequester.
Koh Khia Tong (Y5S2)
Studio by Erik G. L’Heureux
Kukoh Transpires
community scaffold of opportunity
Chin Swee used to be the beacon for many who were once lost and beaten up in life, and this light has over time lost its glow and purpose. Even though some of them might have fallen off, these seniors embodied aspirations and great experience ready to inspire the younger ones. The people staying may be temporary, but the community spirit and identity of the aspirations will not be transient. Kukoh Transpires builds upon the transient nature of the community and aims to overcome the stigmatisation and redefining the role of a rental housing neighbourhood in the modern day society - by establishing a stakeholders symbiosis, to encourage a collaborative relationship between the residents and public. The architecture intervention is an integrated project that houses a start up incubation hub as the anchoring program that drives the rest. Chin Swee will be given a new heartbeat that rekindles the community spirit and instils a sense of identity through togetherness in scaffolding for opportunities and working hard for better lives.
Lai Wei Song (Y5S2)
Studio by Johannes Widodo (Dr.)
Antifragility and its Architectural Implications
An Architecture of Emergent Forms
The fragile succumbs to stressors; the resilient stays the same; but the antifragile gains from stressors. Antifragility is a concept coined by Nassim Taleb in his book Antifragile, where he discussed how some things flourish when exposed to stressors. We know for fact that fragile is not good, but in an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world, it is no longer enough to just be resilient because we do not just want to return to the same state after every stressor; we want to gain from and emerge better from them. Simply put, the concept of antifragility is two parts: first, the presence of a stressor and second, the need to transform to surmount and thrive under the stressor. This thesis postulates the fundamental principles of antifragility in the field of architecture are as follows: Morphogenesis/Emergence, Hybridity/Reversibility, Reproducibility on Different Sites, Elemental Replacement, People Authorship/Distributed Network.
Leong Lin Chin (Y5S2)
Studio by Wu Yen Yen
This thesis proposes that in seeking antifragility, architecture transcends itself and becomes instead a device that is used to produce emergent architectural forms. The architect does not design architecture per se, but simply the systems in which these emergent architectural forms thrive. The second semester kicked off via taking a materialist approach, as the various emergent forms of paraffin wax, a substantial by-product of petroleum refining, are investigated, documented and their implications materialized. This thesis is set in point in time in the future when debilitating climate change has made floods a frequent occurrence in many low lying areas in Singapore, and one such neighborhood particularly affected is Tanjong Katong. Two interventions, The Hybrid Street Lamps and The Emergent Flood Relief Center are proposed on two nearby sites in Tanjong Katong, each taking a different approach to antifragility.
New Urban Village
Shixia Village as a Prototype
Urban Village, as a unique phenomenon in the urbanization of Chinese cities, has long been a tough issue to tackle. Numbers of the villages were wiped out to make way for higher plot ratios regardless of their inconspicuous but significant role in city. This thesis project here challenges such traditional mindsets, reveals the value, and potentials of urban village conservation, especially in the context of Shenzhen, the country’s fastest-growing city. Shixia Village is picked as a site for demonstration. Through reprogramming and spatial intervention, the scheme proactively conserves and strengthens the village’s urban quality as well as social landscape, while ensuring economic profitability, living quality, and sustainability. The incorporation of new technologies like automated delivery systems and urban farming technologies improves spatial and production efficiency. In this sense, urban villages not only support the rest of the city as nodes of an invisible infrastructural network. It can offer an alternative way of working and living, nourished from the past, no less than the massively produced “modern norm”.
[Masterplan]
Lin Yingying (Y5S2)
Studio by Ho Weng Hin
[Production Street, Taxi Driver and Logistic Center, Co-living Community, Sharing Tower]
Singapore as The Farm City
Towards a self-sufficient city-state
Humans have built extensive networks of vehicular roads as transportation was seen as an essential component of cities. With the rising population and decreasing arable land on earth, cities will eventually have to feed their population within cities, making food production an essential function. Shortage of essential goods caused by transportation restrictions during the Covid-19 pandemic experienced by numerous cities has exposed the vulnerability of the existing food supply chain, and the importance of decentralised local food production within cities.
In a land-scarce city state, the Farm City envisions the entire city landscape of Singapore as an urban farm, with its processes supported by the various existing components of the city for space, water, energy, labour, and transportation. Ranging from the conversion of underutilised structures to new structures, farm processes will be integrative with the existing city fabric, much like roads in most cities.
Mok Shi Qi, Andy (Y5S2)
Sectional drawing of the Farm Market
Studio by Joseph Lim (Dr.)
With the rising cost of petroleum and vehicle ownership, along with the further development of the public transportation system, the large floor area multi-storey car parks within public housing neighbourhoods will likely be underutilised if private car ownership falls. While more space-efficient parking solutions such as elevator car parks might be sufficient for housing estates, the 1035 multi-storey car parks can be repurposed into production and market farms to decentralised food production, and provide a boost in floor area to strengthen the food security of Singapore.
Cut-away axonometric of the Farm Market
Eco-Esports
Climate Sensitive Esports Design
E2sports: Eco Esports is a thesis project that looks at the caveats of current esports infrastructure and aims to create a new typology of increasingly sustainable esports architecture through the integration of multiple design strategies. In terms of design strategies, there are three aims to my thesis project: 1) to have a purpose built esports design 2) to make it more energy-sustainable via renewable energy strategies and passive design strategies, as well as 3) to incorporate biophilic design to increase user comfort. In terms of programs, 4 different stadium spaces are integrated into the design, with a main central stadium area and 3 others for users to watch digitally - along with various commercial, retail, productions, and athlete training rooms. I started with a 3-dimensional curved Mobius form which I felt was geometric and conveyed the technological modernity of “esports” - as well as using various curved layers which was an attempt at biophilic design, for most things in nature follow curves and not straight lines. Thus, through the form-making, I hoped to reconcile technology and nature.
Ong Xin Yee, Elaina (Y5S2)
Studio by Yuan Chao
Rendered Perspective from Waterfront
In terms of functionality, the nature of a 3D Mobius strip allowed for a constantly changing tilt angle, which then allowed me to optimise the placement of solar panels. With a designed form, I then proceeded to design a steel truss system that ran along the Mobius volume for structural purposes as well as connecting to the cantilevered central egg space, giving a sense of a “floating stadium” that also featured a steel truss system. The floating stadium was, again, not purely for aesthetic , but also helped to facilitate the natural ventilation through the space. Openings were created in the Mobius volume and the central egg in the prevailing wind direction to create a cross ventilation wind current through the space, in an attempt to integrate passive design strategies to reduce reliance on mechanical HVAC. Stack ventilation was also induced - the solar panels contributed to the temperature difference between the ground and the 4th floor, thus creating wind currents as hot air rises - as well as having biophilic design on lower spaces that lowered the temperature, thus increasing the temperature difference.
Renders, Plans, Sections
2050 Conscious
Redefining public housing
Studio by Hans Brouwer
Sarah Wong Si Min (Y5S2)
The Conscious city was coined by architect Itai Palti and neuroscientist Prof Moshe, in their attempts to create a society that understands the people, one that alleviates social issues and establishes an empathetic environment.
Then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew had the vision to prioritise human resource development, as Singapore has no natural resources and must rely on manpower to progress. The constant movement of a productive workforce has created additional stress on the community, which negatively influences an individual’s mental wellbeing. This thesis questions, what if our city prioritises the ideology of conscious city in planning over efficiency and productivity? Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic raised mental health-related issues, as the lockdown amplified the lack of social connection. The HDB model was perceived as a symbol of self-isolation that lacks human interaction. Introduced in the 1960s to tackle the shortage.
Furthermore, the housing policy favours the family nucleus which questions the notion of social cohesion and inclusivity in the community. This thesis examines the progression of social cohesion and critiques the current HDB model and attempts to redefine public housing to improve the wellbeing and social cohesion of the residents.
The New Normal of Muara Gembong
Reimagining Muara Gembong As a Self-Governing and Sustainable Village of The Future
Set in the Year 2050, the thesis aims to reimagine an alternate reality of Muara Gembong, one that is freed from the reins of the government and where a new urban and social order is defined. Akin to the idea of a plug-and-play lego concept, the making of the new village is proposed through the implementation of a set of modular key parts that can be assembled and configured in any way, creating infinite possibilities of arrangements, and still be connected to one another.
The project hopes to facilitate the development of Muara Gembong in the years ahead, and empower locals to build and work collectively together, ultimately creating a continuum of spaces and programs that are part of an interconnected network of mobile communities that promotes a culture of sharing and collective decision-making. The end manifestation presented does not end there, but rather opens up possibilities of the village evolving and growing further.
Exterior aerial perspective
Seetoh Hui Yi, Jeslyn (Y5S2)
Studio by Neo Sei Hwa
Circular Consciousness
Building Public Awareness of a Closed-Loop Construction
Studio by Shinya Okuda
Joanne Seng (Y5S2)
This thesis seeks to raise public awareness on circular materials and construction processes, thus promoting their construction viability and positive environmental impact in an everdeveloping Singapore.
Embodied carbon in the built industry (ie. materials and construction processes) accounts for 11% of global carbon emissions. The circular economy has fortunately emerged as a viable solution to reduce emissions, though it remains an intangible concept for the layman.
In response, this thesis explores circularity through design across 3 scales in the new Sungei Kadut Eco-District: the larger urban fabric, the circular collective and the build-to-order residential kits.
Curating an environment that exemplifies true sustainability will be able to spark conversations and curiosity about the circular model. Additionally, it can serve as a positive driver for people to implement circularity in other areas of their life, growing them to be more carbon- and circular-conscious citizens.
The project does not propose a singular architecture to solve such a complex issue. Instead, it offers a humble proposal of how design may shape and influence the norms of the construction industry, the living habits as well as choices made by people.
Refreshing POPS
A New Typology of Consumption Spaces
McDonald’s is the most familiar and easily accessible consumption space. The McRefugee phenomenon shows how McDonald’s doesn’t follow the traditional standard of a consumption space. This seems to contradict when a consumption space welcomes people that do not seem to be active consumers, leading to the question of whether there can be a new reformulation of POPS. The goal of this thesis is to see how we can extrapolate this beyond McDonald’s, by using McDonald’s as a theoretical base. Therefore, Refreshing POPS emphasises not only the economic aspects but also the social and environmental aspects with this new circular management model. This new typology of consumption space that integrates circularity could benefit socially and environmentally through spaces for city transients constructed from food waste materials, and private corporations could benefit economically from more customers and sales from the internal farm’s produce.
Sharmaine Lee Pui Fong (Y5S2)
Studio by Cho Im Sik (Dr.)
Claiming Ground
Future Architectures of Cultivation
Claiming Ground is an exploration of the architectures of cultivation in Housing and Development Board (HDB) landscapes, of present and future. The project learns from the infrastructures of current community garden practices, with a special focus on the ground as a lively fabric that shapes future urban form. In Singapore, cultivation has been demolished, moved to the edges of the city, or relegated to small pockets. The ground is often cultivated as ‘open’ or as a ‘void’. Claiming Ground is hence crucial in claiming the ground anew, and as a space that emerges from community practices. The architect has a role to play in supporting gardeners, as design of both future buildings and landscape often ignores existing cultivation practices as having formgiving power. The project is demonstrated through a close reading of one HDB estate, namely Ang Mo Kio, as this estate has high building density and a large percentage of elderly population, many of whom are gardeners. Overall, the project speaks to a desire of many people, not just the elderly, to cultivate their own food and tend a garden in the actual ground.
Cultivation in a newly opened garden
Astoria Tan (Y5S2)
Studio by Victoria Jane Marshall
An Approach to Multi-species Architecture
I have always been disturbed by the way the Human - as an animal species - has evolved and developed its unique set of ethics with regard to how it considers, treats and lives with the rest of the animal kingdom. Anthropocentric worldviews naturally lead to the design of anthropocentric architecture. Architecture structures designed to privilege the Human, that are legible only to the Human, remain problematic as they continue to ignore the needs of non-human stakeholders.
I query how the close examination of a non-human protagonist - the red junglefowl - subsequently leading to its consideration as equivalent “homeowner”, might inform the way we conceive of and design for cohabitation in an primarily human domain.
Tan Xuan (Y5S2)
Studio by A/Prof Ong Ker-Shing
Towards Independence
Integrated Housing for Adults with Autism
Studio by Tan Beng Kiang
Wu Lingyi (Y5S2)
Over the years, there has been an increase in autism cases worldwide, including in Singapore, where 1 in 150 children is diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) as of 2016. The increase in mainly due to an increase in awareness, broadening diagnostic criteria, and the introduction of the spectrum concept under the DSM-5.
The Singapore government has provided support services and facilities to aid persons with autism (PWA) through early detection and childhood intervention. However, the support given to PWA who are adults or will be transitioning into adulthood is lacking. Many PWA and their families suffer from a loss of assistance once their child “graduates” from the special needs education system. With insufficient assistance to aid PWA in transitioning into adulthood and independent living, many youths with autism may relapse into severe autistic behaviour.
Hence, this thesis project aims to to be a starting point for a more inclusive housing community that will help those on the autism spectrum to move towards being more independent, through communal support systems within smaller clusters and specific design strategy that will aid those with ASD. Communal facilities would also provide employment opportunities to adults with autism, empowering them with skill sets needed to become more independent.
The Wildlife City
A Design Proposal of Ecological Urban Design Method
Studio by Rudi Stouffs
Zhang Ruijia (Y5S2)
As a nature lover, I am surprised by the close relationship between human and wildlife when first arrived in Singapore. The limited space and tropical weather allows it to be a perfect experimental site for a long-existing idea in my brain - can our futural city become a wildlife wonderland.
The thesis aims to explore an innovative urban design principle, which calls both the wildlife protection and better human living environment. In Singapore, as a result of limited land space, it is inevitable to live together with urban wildlife. As the urban development increasing, it is necessary to find a new design proposal for proper human-animal relationship regarding the growing interaction. Meanwhile, a harmonious city with wildlife has become a unique identity of Singapore. Both biologically and culturally, the wildlife design proposal is strongly wanted.
To achieve it, animal shall be considered as the same citizen as people. The thesis attempt to treat all biological life in city as a target object interpreted by data and computer. The whole process is to build an ecological urban design of all scale with both theoretical and quantitative analysis.
Vertical Eco-system
Clumsy Architecture
For Wicked Urban Problems
Studio by Asst. Prof. Zhang Ye
RJ Zheng [Renjie] (Y5S2)
In the minefield of stakeholder tensions that stands between the practitioner and successful design outcomes, lies seen and unseen mines. Those we can see, we need to focus on defusing it. Left undefused, gaps in design outcomes will occur. Those we cannot see, we need to uncover them before it becomes too late to defuse. In response, this thesis proposes the Clumsy Architecture Initiative – a stakeholder tension minesweeper – into the practitioners’ arsenal. The Minesweeper consist firstly a mine-defusing shared manual in the form of a knowledge repository that practitioners may find potential solutions to defuse these multitude of tension mines. And secondly a mine-detection toolkit to aid practitioners to uncover tension mines that we do not see.
Trial courses developed and delivered to groups of students demonstrated the efficacy of the mine-detector toolkit. They were able to grasp the toolkit quickly, uncover stakeholder tension mines effectively, and in response intuitively made tangible improvements to their design schemes. Practitioners introduced to the Clumsy Architecture Minesweeper express support for its practical application towards addressing a salient real-world problem, and the potential of its contribution to the profession. This thesis serves as a foundation for the Clumsy Architecture Minesweeper to be developed further and proliferated into local education and professional development.
This thesis attempts to explore a new urban typology that streamlines the process of rail-based food import, creating filtering shells that outline spaces for urban vibrancy while not only meeting the requirements for food provision, but injecting elements of fun into the process as well. The incumbent long-winded distribution chain is reimagined as an integrated system where the transport vehicle itself serves as a part of the market for consumers to directly source their food.
The transit station then becomes a lively marketplace, where commuters can source for fresh ingredients directly from the trains themselves. As such, the system of food distribution and retail becomes integrated with the infrastructure and cadastral patterns of the city, incorporating the market with elements of fun and whimsicality, while remaining highly adaptable and flexible to respond to future contingencies.
Zuo Yuchen (Y5S2)
Studio by A/P Joseph Lim (Dr)
Shell’s Down | Power’s Up
Adaptive reuse of Pasir Panjang Power Station & the Power District
Studio by Richard Ho
Ian Tay Zhe Jun (Y5S2)
Once a power district that was responsible for supplying a bulk of Singapore’s power, what is left now is just an empty shell, which barely echoes its significant past. Thus, this thesis intends to examine and break down the existing components of Pasir Panjang Power Station ‘A’, explore possibilities to celebrate its rich historic character and breathe life back into it.
Considering the site’s immediate context and Singapore’s ambition for a future low-carbon nation, the Power Station will be transformed into a conference venue. Serving as a catalyst to foster energy development, it aims to promote collaboration, support new ways of working and learning through the notion of ‘Office as a Campus’ and to avoid a single tenant enterprise. With the 2040 Greater Southern Waterfront redevelopment plan set in place, this thesis also aims to transform the Power District into a hub for alternative clean energy and create meaningful and memorable spaces for the public.
Once a building that generated power, it could now generate new hopes and possibilities for a future vibrant and lively environment for everyone to enjoy.
[ Longitudinal section of Pasir Panjang Power Station ‘A’ ]
The Bachelor of Landscape Architecture (BLA) is a four-year Honours degree programme that prepares students to respond to multifaceted socio-ecological issues in Asia through critical thinking, analytical inquiry, and creative expression. BLA provides core foundation training in skills and knowledge that equips our graduates for professional practice or entry into advanced Master degree programmes. Relevant topics, including tropicality, site specificity, boundaries and scales, densification, multifunctionality, and placemaking are played out in the programme through integrated learning platforms in design studios and lectures. BLA is taught in unique education settings that concurrently promotes speculation in design and at the same time being produces grounded and action-oriented design outcomes relevant to real life issues.
The Master of Landscape Architecture (MLA) is a two-year, full-time degree programme for individuals seeking advanced and cutting-edge training in landscape architecture.
The intensive and rigorous course engages students with the following emphasis:
Independence and excellence in design. As an advanced course, MLA provides a structured platform for students to pursue areas aligned with their own interests in depth, independent design, and intellectual inquiry.
Research as a foundation for design. Situated in a large research intensive university ranked among the top in Asia and the world, MLA emphasizes the use of research to critically identify and explore socio-ecological issues of the site.
Interdisciplinary collaboration. Hosted by the Department of Architecture which has a longstanding reputation as the top Asian Architecture School and one of the top ten schools in the world.
Developing leadership in practice. Landscape architecture as a professional practice is constantly evolving and the roles of landscape architects are gradually expanding into new frontiers of practice. Our graduates will contribute to critical discourse and shape the practice by providing thought leadership.
BLA MLA
ALTOAIMI LINA WALID S
A Living, Changing Water Edge
ABDUL LATIFF HAMZAH
Weave A Campus
JUDITH TAY XUE YING
Re:transit BRINA CHOO
The Labyrinth
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE
KUAN SHIQI NADIA
Water in Flux
CHING WAI LUM
Pause in Transit LIM YAU, DEXTER
Deliberate Spontaneity
TAN SOK VIN
Digital Playscape - Waterscape
MARIAM YUSUF RAJKOTWALA
Pixelated Memories
ANDERSON WONG KUI LOK
Canal For The People
HO JING JING
Tanglin V
FANG TING | HE XIAOWEI | XIANG WENQIN
Thick Boundaries-A vision for co-conservation in Prek Toal
JIANG YULI | LIU ZIYUE | YE HAN
RE+
WAYNE TAN
Quar-Otters
ZHANG YIJIE
Humanising Yishun Neighbourhood
Park
TAN SOK VIN
The Nexus
HAO JUN
Mekong Futures
A Living, Changing Water Edge
A canal that harnesses erosion and sedimentation
Erosion and sedimentation are natural processes as the result of powerful movement of water through a landscape. These processes are often perceived as harmful, as they can manipulate terrain and topography and may threaten safety. Despite this, they nonetheless have benefits, such as filtering soil of dead organic materials and transporting nutrients into bodies of water to aid nearby aquatic ecosystems. Sediment can also be a natural resource utilized as on- site construction materials, providing economic benefits as well. Moreover, these processes can appeal to humans when accessible; large-scale movement of sediment is often difficult to observe without a bird’s eye view. Therefore, this project aims to translate these processes into space observable on foot– by designing a canal with flowing water and different edge conditions, through designed space and over time.
A 500m canal, with varying widths between 10 to 40m, is designed with two sides, the first being a natural, “living” water edge allowing people to interact with sediment, while the other is more “urbanized”, allowing people to view the other side from different perspectives.
Lina Altoaimi (Y1S1)
Final plan
Studio by Yun Hye Hwang
Along the “natural” edge are sometimes small clusters of 1m tall hills that may concentrate sediment around for people to interact with and observe. At the centre of the canal are “floating islands”, further exemplifying erosion, with varying edge-conditions. Artificial elements, like stepping stones and a walking/jogging stairway-like promenade, allow people to appreciate the slowly changing terrain of this canal. Bridges are introduced to connect the two sides of the canal, and allow for an aerial view of erosion occurring. Moreover, on the “urban” side of the canal are linear additions of bioswales functioning to collect, filter, and deposit polluted surface runoff visibly into the canal. Pathways can be introduced to the “natural” side by collecting sediment deposits after 5-10 years and constructing the path with these on-site materials. This project is designed to fit into part of the existing Sungei Pandan Kechil waterway near NUS. This waterway is connected to the open sea, where there is dynamic water flow at a sea-land interface.
Design process
Operational diagrams and perspectives of the canal
Above are large and small-scale plans of Kranji Reservoir, drawn to investigate the relationship between sediment movement , water drainage, and soil types.
Above are a painting and illustrations of water textures, and how water appears on different surfaces. These ideas were implemented in the final canal design.
(Left) A small-scale model of the canal (Right) working models
Understanding a man-made water edge at Botanic Gardens- overhead illustration.
Water in Flux
‘Fluidity’ of Hydrology Through Topography
Studio by Yun Hye Hwang
Kuan Shiqi Nadia (Y1S1)
Hydrology possesses the unique spatial characteristic where its form differs vastly depending on its environment, yet that environment only presents that specific condition because of water and how successfully it sustains its surroundings. Concurrently, water flow also has the functional purposes of heavily impacting plant growth, oxygen levels and sediment erosion.
A 1ha gentle grass mound is designed to slow down and reduce the volume of stormwater runoff, while serving the recreational purpose of open-air theatre and a water play area, drawing attention to the interdependent relationship between topography and hydrology overall. In response, the land has a variety of high and low topographical points which demonstrate a contrast in water flows. Bioswales are employed in areas with steep slope percentages to slow the speed of flow and absorb stormwater into its filtration layers. Other elements such as porous pavement and rain gardens absorb and pump rainwater into underground cisterns upon rainfall, from which it is distributed into watering the lawn and maintaining constant streamflow in the play area during the dry season.
The water play area capitalises on rainfall’s effect on the land. The pillars simultaneously draw attention to the changing water levels upon rainfall and facilitate play with the bioswale, and a sand pit demonstrates the water’s effect on sediment, emphasising creative free play. In the open-air theatre area, linear seating which traces the topographic lines points towards the screen, encouraging users of the space to linger and notice each increase in incline. A bridge spans across the central valley, allowing users to easily access the highest points and overlook the valley to observe the overall change in landscape when the water level is high, and the rain gardens below when the water level is low.
With this space, users of all age groups will be able to actively interact with water and the land’s symbiotic relationship, observing the water edge’s dynamism across climate changes.
Functional diagram and perspective views of the final design, after building upon clay thumbnails, tonal and speed maps during the process.
Weave A Campus
NUS Human Highway
During the Stage of Analysis, a diagram was plotted to highlight the ineffectiveness of the circulation and ‘green spaces’ within Kent Ridge Campus with the basis of ‘Campus in a Rainforest’ as a guiding principle. From there it was decided that developing on the circulation aspect of the analysis and coming up with a more effective circulation framework for the Kent Ridge Campus was key.
The ‘Highway Network’ acts as an alternate circulation that is more direct from cluster to cluster as compared to the YCCN but also a network that feeds back into the YCCN at central ‘junctions’ of academic clusters to facilitate building to building circulation. The Highway is both part of the YCCN in its connections and elements of identity through screening but distinct in it circulation and junctions.
Abdul Latiff Hamzah (Y2S1)
Perspective of Human Highway with ‘Junction’
Studio by Lehana Guo
Through the strategy of Addition and Enhancement of the current Yellow-Ceiling Corridor Network (YCCN), a study of the existing network and possible routes were done with sections of spaces denoting designated widths that can be marked as low consideration, implicated widths, and high considerations. From the study of the spaces, a route and possible form could be derived from spatial considerations that the route takes. Considerations like minimum height requirements and fire engine access regulations affected the route of the walkway as well as accessibilty considerations and minimum comfortable width for the walkway.
Pause in Transit
Redesigning Transitional Spaces
Pause in Transit is a project that redesigns transitional space, allowing users to live in the moment. As university students lead a fast-paced life with submissions and exams at every corner, how can we counter work fatigue? Can the spaces we pass by daily be transformed into enjoyable spaces where users can relax in?
From personal experience, I found myself degree chasing at the start of the term and that made me feel burnt out even before my first submission. I felt the need to slow down and enjoy the process of learning without being overly results-oriented.
With that in mind, my project aims to improve students’ wellbeing by spending more time outside engaging in physical activity. With the use of biophilic design, native plants of the ridge are stretched out to the students through the creation of passive spaces.
Ching Wai Lum (Y2S1)
Image One: Site Plan of Pause in Transit
Studio by Kenya Endo, Lehana Guo
The analysis of the carpark, amenities, hydrology, and topography around the site, affected the design as pockets of opportunities arose. The topography and hydrology analysis played an important role as they were used to redesign the drainage on-site to improve the quality of ecology on site. Taking inspiration from the parking lots as a space divider, the essence of the carpark was then improved through its design language. Making use of the widths of the lots and staggering the length, an interesting human-scaled carpark is created. The creation of smaller and more intimate white spaces can be observed in images on the left where a selection of spaces on site are accompanied by their suggested activities.
The repurposing of carparks, if adopted by campus, when multiplied across the school can possibly alleviate overall students’ mental health while improving the biodiversity on campus. With this project, it is possible to transform transitional spaces into enjoyable spaces where students are able to take a break.
Amenitiy, hydrology maps and Renders
Re:transit
Redefining & reimagining car parks
The rapid development of automotive technology has led to a car-centric society, becoming a national and global issue that results in negative economical, environmental and social impacts. To tackle this issue and align with Singapore’s vision, the project named Re:transit, plans to transform the National University of Singapore into a Car-Lite campus through carparks, that are under-utilised and situated at prominent locations.
The concept is to redefine and reimagine car parks in the future by breaking of the regular, monotonous shape that are commonly defined by lines, through adding layers of activities, re-directing movement and flow, and changing its boundaries. Meanwhile, the main design strategies used are to create seamless transitions between different streetscape elements, introducing multi-purpose spaces and changing the focus and needs of different mobility devices.
[ Phase 2: Plan ]
Judith Tay Xue Ying (Y2S1)
Studio by Kenya Endo
[ Vision ]
Concept Diagram ]
[ Part Models: Open social space, semi-private social space and pathway that connects the two car parks ]
DELIBERATE SPONTANEITY
connectivity and maintenance
The aim of the design was to be a pilot project in improving the connectivity within NUS campus and reducing landscape maintenance cost with spontaneous vegetation. Inspiration was drawn from a reasearch done on campus in 2017: Observation of floristic succession and biodiversity on rewilded lawns in a tropical city (Hwang, Yue & Tan, 2017), to study the effectiveness of spontaneous vegetation. Based on studying the organization’s financial reports, 66.00% of Cash Outflow was contributed by Operative Activities (FY19/20) which consisted of landscape maintenance. The proposed design was calculated to reduce the maintenance cost by 28.85%. Design concept was derived from the creation of informal paths. This is supported by the implementation of Pavers which are placed at intervals to direct the encroachment of plants and intentionally planting softscape at areas where wind would “carry” the seeds toward wind disperson zones. Overall, there is an aespect that only time can tell how the natural movements of plant encroachment and humans would define the most efficient paths.
Lim Yau, Dexter (Y2S1)
Studio by Lehana Guo
The Labyrinth
Digital Playscape
An Exploratory Playscape based on Ants and the sense of touch. Ants were used as the main key concept for The Labyrinth due to the nature of its sensory behaviour towards the environment, the living conditions and the interaction between two ants. In order for ants to communicate with other ants, they are required to touch each other’s anntennas. These antennas are known as ‘elbowed feelers’, it helps ants to touch, smell and communicate with other ants. Hence, knowing of the requirements of the ants interaction to communicate, smell and touch. The sense of touch becomes the secondary key concept for The Labyrinth.
With the ideation of two concepts, The Labyrinth is designed to recreate the ant’s environment, sensory behavior and movement, through the sense of touch of different textures and materials. In summary, The Labyrinth is an exploratory playscape for users to explore and interact through the sense of touch and the mazelike environment that mimics similarly to an ant nest.
Overall View of The Labyrinth
Brina Choo Si Min (Y3S1)
Studio by Dr. Ervine Lin Shengwei
Dr. Terrence Tan Chun Liang
The Layout of The Labyrinth
Vantage point @ Water Play: In the view of the ant’s Perspective
Vantage point @ Exploratory Forest: Scenic View
Layering of Platforms and Circulation
Waterscape
Digital Playscape
The use of hydrology as the main component in inducing active play and learning. By utilizing the existing pond in the Dover Trail site, the focus of Waterscape is steered towards the interaction with waterbodies and the modification of topography to enhance the experiential play in users. The Digital Playscape is heavily dependant on the use of BIM and parametric modelling which are generated through the use of Rhino3D and Grasshopper scripts, producing a set of accurate and logical modification to the landscape and its topography. The specific designs of the playscape are also determined in coherence to the accommodation of circulation paths, creation of an unbroken play flow, the nature of site hydrology network as well as the existing topography to facilitate a holistic interactive water playscape. The bathymetry of the hydrological network are also modified to enhance the quality of play and exploration, especially in the Island Play Pond, lifting the limits and impressions of playing in water as well as promoting the differences and opportunities that could be present in water play.
[ Additional Caption ]
Tan Sok Vin (Y3S1)
Studio by Dr. Ervine Lin Shengwei
Dr. Terrence Tan Chun Liang
InterconnectedPlay
UnbrokenPlayFlow
PrimaryCirculation
BathymetryModification
Pixelated Memories
A Covid19 Memorial: Fighting the Pandemic
Pixelated memories shape the silent and invisible Covid19 pandemic narratives - the stories we will tell as individuals, as communities, as societies and as a nation about this period, that transformed lives. Situated opposite Istana, this public memorial will amplify the resiliency of Singapore and its people as they navigated through this ‘blurry’ period with obstacles at every turn. This memorial strives to evoke emotions by representing social memories of the pandemic in a series of local and communal markers by using the design concept of pixels. This design not only uses pixels at various materials, scales, topography, and program but also creates intentional spatial experiences for all users, locals, and tourists through the ‘covid cut’ into the earth and field of pixels. Shaded areas with cool and drying mist have been seamlessly integrated into the design to encourage users to linger.
Pixelated Memories is integrated into the city and is a memorial that reflects both tragedy and optimism, leaving it up to one on how they choose to interpret it.
Mariam Yusuf Rajkotwala (Y1S2)
Studio by Ryan Shubin
Memorial Master Plan and User Perspective Drawings
CONCEPT DIAGRAM FOR COVID19 MEMORIAL
PIXELATED MEMORIES
DESIGN GESTURES FOR COVID19 MEMORIAL
Quar-Otters
Resort for our local sea-critters
Design statement: The core of this project is to give otters a personal space to inhabit. After a recent viral video showing otters crossing the road with the help of bystanders got uploaded online, it was only fitting for me to take on the challenge of giving the cute sea critters a place within the public eye.
The goal of this design is to create a private habitat for the otters. My gestures would tackle flow improvements of both human and vehicular traffic, as well as designing safe routes for the otters to navigate toward the site. Vegetation species have been selected for both storm-water management and provides fish species a safe space for cultivation and food. Users would be able to experience the habitat up-close while maintaining a safe distance observing otters in their habitat.
[ Additional Caption ]
Wayne Tan (Y1S2)
Studio by Ryan Shubin
Canal for the People
Well-being through Environmental Placemaking
In land-scarce Singapore, densification has become an unfortunate side effect which not only changes our physical environment, but also erodes our quality of life. Analyzing this site which extends from the new town of Canberra to the border of Yishun, we see the potential to transform this area, using green and blue infrastructure to counter densification, while paying attention to the well-being of the users in the area.
One of the key design area in the site is a concrete canal which serves as a tidal canal to allow water to flow in when the tide rises. Named Sungei Simpang Kiri, the concrete canal holds potential to become both a destination and a transition between Canberra and the neighbouring Yishun Industrial Estate. To realise this, the idea of environmental placemaking is employed to create an environment that is socially and ecologically sound for the well-being of the community.
Sunrise over Sungei Simpang Kiri
Anderson Wong (Y2S2)
Studio by Henry Steed, Abby Ng
Futurescape @
Yishun
Canberra
Humanising Yishun Neighbourhood Park
Futurescape - new ways to unify the entire landscape of the Yishun-Canberra District to fulfil future policy aims for the vision of a City in Nature. By designing the green and blue infrastructure for the future, our team aims to provide hyper living and hyper mobility for people. Hyper mobility aims to increase efficiency and quality of circulation and hyper living aims to optimise the use space.
Yishun Neighbourhood Park expends the opportunity of the park usage which allows for more people to be actively involved. In my project, I embedded the two overarching strategies - hyper mobility and hyper living - into my design for the Yishun Neighbourhood Park, which is an essential part of the green chain. The park is divided into five zones, each for industrial workers, students, residents, elderly residents and everyone. Each zone is equipped with meaningful and interesting programmes, catering to the natural context of the park as well as the demographic needs of the target users.
Zhang Yijie (Y2S2)
Studio by Henry Steed, Abby Ng
A convenient and relaxing way to guide in people from industrial zone to top of the park.
To supplement existing allotment garden which requires tedious administrative process and charge temporary owners.
To provide a farming experience for school kids to nurture their green fingers.
To enrich the residents’ life and support their daily dietary consumption.
To provide activity and social gathering space for communities and schools.
A big flat lawn now substituted by flowery grass for people to do activities freely.
A pavilion made of biodegradable material collected from the site for people to rest.
A natural playground built on slopes that enhances players’ motion skills and create an entertaining experience for people.
A sensory path that allows kids to craft their own sensory path and be educated about material and nature.
To provide a unique walking experience for visitors, where they can walk barefoot to enjoy it maximally.
A flat elongated physiotherapy trail for elderly residents situated in lush forest, implemented with elderly-catering exercise facilities.
Attached to it is a dog run area, where agility facilities are implemented for dogs to have fun.
It is located next to residential areas and less accessible to other zones. It is meant to be a quiet, enclosed space exclusively for residents to enjoy.
A flower field for all to relax
An enclave for elderly residents and their dogs
A space for residents to enjoy the nature and peace
A classroom in nature for students
Tanglin V
Transition Through Colour Approaches
Ho Jing Jing (Y3S2)
Involuntary relocation, resulting from urban redevelopment, can create a profound sense of loss in identity and community for the elderly. Therefore, the attachment to place and fading of old memories would require time to part with. In pursuit of achieving a higher urban density, the older estates in Tanglin Halt would be replaced with dense high-rise developments, ringing in a new community of younger families. Displaced older residents would be moved to Dawson, further from their network of trusted support systems.
“Tanglin V” aims to provide a smooth transition with colours whilst addressing the retention of memory, high urban density, and building of future connections within the site. Colour approaches as a transitionary tool for the elderly would aid four objectives: the preservation of Tanglin’s entrepreneurial heritage, connection between residents of different estates through mobile services, the physical and psychological transition of old to new memories, and the scaling of urban
Activated spaces and colour approaches through materiality and wayfinding
Studio by Kenya Endo
Evi Syariffudin
Service buildings interspersed amongst fruit-orchard inspired pocket parks
developments on site. These are implemented through phases, with the gradual introduction of colour strategies and progressive demolition of the buildings.
This paves the way for a communal village park, replete with modern re-enactments of the “kampong spirit” with the retention of iconic Tanglin motifs, small community buildings, and the provision of social services.
The Nexus
A Place for Gathering
Reconnecting the old and the young residents as well as to bring in new users from outside of Queenstown, the Nexus aims to rejuvenate and reidentify the idea of landscapes for intergenerational mingling through the merging of infrastructures in the town, creating spaces of flexibility and multifunctionality. The intersection of green spaces through the Alexandra Queensway PCN to the Botanic Gardens and the Alexandra Linear Park towards the new commercialized space forms a crucial node in bringing the residing and visiting users together while at thes ame time, enhancing the connectivity of people to their necessities through a lush environment. To reintegrate, rejuvenate, repurpose, and reconnect the underutilized spaces and the users to one another, the nature of Nexus further enhances the liveability of Queenstown as a Health District through the utilization of technology such as piezoelectric discs and solar glasses into infrastructures help to harvest renewable energy from the surroundings and human movements, binding the existence of both the people and ecology in a single living space.
Tan Sok Vin (Y3S2)
Studio by Kenya Endo Evi Syariffudin
Thick Boundaries
Co-conservation in Prek Toal
by He Xiaowei
Tonle sap lake biosphere provides 70 percent of Cambodia’s protein. The imminent impact of new upstream dams on the Tonle Sap Lake ecosystem will threaten local livelihoods and the ecological systems of the region. Our project addresses the history of deep-rooted environmental injustices due to restrictive boundary regulations along the Tonlé Sap Lake by recognizing the knowledge and practices of the indigenous local communities.
We use animated videos to speculate on a future in which a top-down decision-making system cannot solve large technical project problems by purely technical means. To prevent a tragic future, we proposed to move from boundary to bond, harnessing indigenous wisdom and empowering communities to achieve a co-conservation biosphere.
Fang Ting (Y2S2)
Section Perspective
(Y2S2)
Xiang Wenqin (Y2S2)
Studio Dorothy Tang
Huei Lyn Liu
Our project reimagines the relationship between local communities and the UNESCO funded Prek Toal Bird Sanctuary and Ramsar Site. We propose the thickening of conservation boundaries to empower local communities and transform the geographically bounded nature reserves to a co-conservation biosphere based on a collaborative governance structure and ecological infrastructure.
Existing potential channels are identified and connected based on existing topography and predicted water level rise, and new channel branches are excavated as a basis for reforestation and fire prevention. Bivalves will form protective measures along the lakeshore and strategically protect existing forests, leveraging the properties of freshwater mangroves to enhance the resilience of the habitat. The strategy of co-governance is based on the diversification of modes of living, developing an enhanced framework of responsibility and accountability to achieve community-based decision making power framework.
Proposed intervention
Agrotopia
Blockchain and Building Mutual Trust in Rural Cambodia
Krong Stueng Saen is endowed with rich farming and water resources and highly productive local farmers. However, like many other agricultural regions, the profits of the agricultural products are exploited by large cooperations and logistical companies. The region is currently undergoing complex changes as it transitions from rural to desakota regions, and eventually towards an urban economy. Similarly, indigenous agricultural species are being replaced by modern hybridized crop varieties and mechanized farming methods. In order to preserve the potential of this nascent agricultural region, we propose a blockchain system powered by micro hydropower that will empower local farmers by protecting their autonomy while improving access to markets, and in turn lead to mutual trust and the reorganization of ecological and landscape systems.
Perspective of Rural Landscape
Dreamy, HONG Mengyi
Jeff, HAO Jun TAN Shuyue
Studio by Dorothy Tang Huei Lyn Liu
RE+
Recycled Construction Material
Jiang Yuli (Y4S2)
Liu Ziyue (Y4S2)
Ye Han (Y4S2)
A highly urbanized city like Singapore is constantly in flux - construction, demolition, re-construction. The “RE+” concept is derived from the transient nature of urban construction materials. Three strategies define this concept, ‘Re-Position’, ‘Re-Value’, ‘Re-Fresh’.
Using the analysis of global carbon dioxide emission trends, the consumption rate of construction raw materials, and the impact of emerging social events on material prices, the project identifies 3 key issues to be addressed: 1) the high CO 2 emission from construction works, 2) depleting supply of natural resources, 3) over-reliance on imported materials.
The 800ha Paya Lebar Air Base (PLAB) site in Singapore is slated for urban redevelopment. The project classified and calculated the expected demolition material and their respective volumes, while also considering the projected population size and future urban planning needs. The gathered data informed the construction input and output requirement for the redevelopment.
The 3 strategies work in tandem using recycled demolition waste as the catalyst for urban regeneration.
Studio by Guo Yunjia Lehana
Framework
Environmental Issue
High Carbon Emission
Re-Position
Material Processing Route Education Route Area of Recycling Center
Hectare
It can accommodate the recycled materials from about 200 buildings at the same time.
ENERGY SOURCE
Relocate integrated recycling centers on site; Redefine waste management and recycling centers as an “attractive and lively urban space" in the neighborhood.
Re-Position Recycled Material Prototypes Landscape Typologies
Re-Value Re-Fresh
Creatively set up a rental system for recycled materials, giving new value to waste, and extending the life cycle of recycled products.
Use the educational significance of landscape space to awaken people's awareness of material recycling and resource protection.
Re-Value
Re-Fresh
prologue
To all of the students who kindly shared with us their work and brought their models out all the way to be part of our exhibition, we are grateful for your support. To our vendors who have worked with us, thanks for being patient and understanding. To Professor Richard Ho and faculty members, thanks for guiding us and giving us pointers through this whole process. Lastly and most importantly, to our dear ArchiVal Team. Through many challenges thank you all for sticking with us through thick and thin. This exhibition-festival is a testament to your grit and hard work and we hope that you took away many valuable learning experiences away from it.
