Kai Jun
Provoking the stagnation of Singapore’s public housing, thus speculating a change in different aspects of it.
Due to the mass production of housing, standardisation were a necessity for building. However, what if we start to change the mathematical formula or even the simple geometrical shapes? Thus, the project will be split into three different aspects of Singapore’s public housing.
Form – Observation as to whether a change in the form within the flat will result in a different way of living.
Function – Changing the activities happening within the interior of a HDB* apartment through speculating different scenarios that would cause a change to the function within the HDB.
Fabrication – Looking for a different construction method to provoke the traditional method of construction for Singapore’s public housing. Looking at the social fabric of Singapore, which could speed up the process of getting a HDB apartment.
This project proposes a new policy for public housing to be accessible to a new social group, beyond the traditional family unit.
*HDB – The Housing & Development Board (HDB) is Singapore’s public housing authority and a statutory board under the Ministry of National Development.
INTRO WITH COLLAGES.
Creating architecture from the interior.
FORM.
The design is to take all the rational understanding in Singapore’s Public Housing and fitting it into a hyper-rational geometrical typology. Using the same floor area and apply it to a different shape, instead of rectangle or square shape.
Comparing the past and the present layout. The total area of the house is getting smaller over the years. The requirements needed to hold a household shelter. More classifications of room despite smaller area. E.g, Service yard and A/C Ledge. The idea is to re-create the public housing in Singapore, I decided not to have a specific site. However, I began setting rules and constraints for myself.
Exploring the different methods. Using different methods of shaping the housing typology.
Fitting the traditional function back and critique on the space. Looking at the floor plan, it is evident that fitting the traditional furniture back into a different geometry would not be a problem. Despite weird angles requires customize furniture, the Interior Space would break the traditional four walls space. Which would provoke the way we live, however, at only a small level of provocation.This result would then lead me to my next project: FUNCTION.
FUNCTION.
Interior space reacts differently towards the purpose or the activity happening in the space. This lead me to the different functions that could occur within Singapore’s Public Housing. Provoking the things happening within the space we living in.
Understanding the functions within Singapore’s Public Housing. The HDB floor plans usual comes with a speculative furniture plan. This gives the client or user an overall idea of how to place their furniture.
Verbs to describe the functions that happens in the space. Defining the activities within the space, helps in planning and prioritize the functions that happens. Eventually, I realized that in order to push the provocation to another level, I had to speculate a possible societal change that could result in changing the current policies of HDB.
The Function project tries to provoke the activities happening in a typical public housing in Singapore. However, I realized that due to societal changes, there could have been a different take by speculating a change in the policies. Thus, designing based on the policies that allows friends to live together is my way of provoking the functions within Singapore’s public housing.Furthermore, the idea of doing both family and friend type apartment side by side is to show the juxtaposition of the 2 floor plans.
FABRICATION.
Societal changes creates provocations which could change the way public housing in Singapore looks. The methods of constructions is another way in provoking the public housing in Singapore. The project looks into the methods of construction and the structural considerations that will eventually affect or show different details.
HDB – Prefabrication Technology. This was taken from the HDB website, an official government website. The idea of prefabrication or precast components for the construction of flats started in 1980s.
Exploration on the different materials and process. Through my own research of 3D printing to understand the process and the limitations of 3D printing. The idea of 3D printing would began to affect the way we live in HDB as walls would no longer be straight, water pipes and electricity can be planned properly with the different software.
The critique on Singapore’s social constructionism. Singapore is a country that has an aging population. The idea of creating a friends policy to buy a HDB would then begin to tackle young Singaporeans to get independent at an earlier age.
CONCLUSION.
To conclude the projects done, all 3 topics are tied together closely with the idea of provoking the current state of Singapore’s Public Housing.
The Form – tackles the architecture view of how Singapore’s public housing could become when we start designing from the interior space. It is also evident for people to witness the change that happened from the form of the building. As we begin to steer away from the idea of Form Follows Function, we can also start freeing ourselves from the system.
The Function – It starts to think of activities that occurs within the Singapore’s public housing. Developing from major events over the nation, certain functions starts to transpire in the space. Provoking the functions through envisioning scenarios, thus resulting a change in the spaces, shows the versatility of Singapore’s public housing.
The Fabrication – stretches the flexibility of the space through exploration of construction techniques. Provoking a change in the traditional way of construction(pre-fabrication), can help in cutting the time and wastage of materials.
Therefore, when we put all 3 topics together, I created a speculated HDB build-to-order(BTO) apartment of the friends policies. The idea is to shape the future of how HDB can look in the future.
