s m a l l p r o j e c t s

s m a l l p r o j e c t s

writing and work

k e v in m a r k l ow
 005

The entry of the louvrebox house,
located as it was on higher ground in
relation to the living area downslope,
required a threshold to bridge a gap
between an entrance courtyard and its
lobby proper: the galvanised grating
mat was designed to allow for the
gentle cleaning of shoe soles and
poetry of late morning shadows.
Previous page: Moss growth on the
textured treads of the gardengate stair.
The growth occurs with intense green
over the monsoon period October
through January each year and returns
the treads to a decomposed dark
brown at the end of each season with
the roughened surface of the treads
providing necessary traction.
contents

007 context
008 phenomenology as process
an introduction to intent
012 the principle of specific context
notes on phenomenological relevance

writing
016 principles and design
028 reality and practice
034 the dogma of economics

work
039 early projects
117 lightwell house
173 the gardenshell buildings
275 small projects
301 catalysts

341 afterword

appendices
345 i. academia - 1983-88
350 ii academia - 1990-91
358 iii. the first ten years - 1992/2002
394 iv. bibliography 1
395 v. bibliography 2
396 vi. project credits
 006 007

The perforated steel treads and risers

of the folded stair. Designed to allow
natural light into a lower ground
entrance, the stair also disguises the
manner of its structural support in the
use of small steel pins from which each
riser is hung as a beam; a solution
originally prompted by the need for
a subtle finishing detail between the

context stair treads and the uneven side walls.

The early parts of an architect’s life have an inbuilt setting for dimming
creativity: the romance of those great school years of experiment
and ideas gives way to the reality of work and client expectations,
to deadlines and speed of execution, the rigors of construction, the
drudgery of submissions and the day to day.

There was a game I played when I first began work as an architect to

keep the passion alive. It was called small projects.

The game basically involved reducing any given task to its smallest
distinct elements in understanding how they all related; a humanising of
each element in the otherwise faceless object of professional practice.
A meeting with a client was about how certain words put together in
particular ways could end in a new idea built or an opportunity lost.
Site work became a project on understanding the subtle differences
between how various contractors thought and the bearing that had
with how they built. The design of a door entailed the reassessment of
each joint to see if the whole could be made any more effective. Basic
functions so taken for granted, like what happens just before sleep and
right after waking or how toilets get used or the way roof eaves and
gutters worked each served as a beginning to subvert the dominant
paradigm: it was about the discovery that the beauty of each and
every little project was less in how they actually turned out than how
the design of each was informed by the dynamics of use and of other
elements or events around them. Relevant design was never about the
object, it was about what the object related itself to. It was all about
how relationships of use and appearance grew from context.

That was, and still is, the basis of smallprojects; less about size or the
registered name of a company than it is about the phenomenlogy of
contextual relevance. The scale of work may have increased, narratives
more complex, but it is still about how the vast relates to the large and
then to the small, and about the specificity of phenomenology to the
physical and associative junctions which bind them all.

This book is about the possibility of context.

 008 009

Opposite: This page:

Top: Sana’a, early 1991.
Winter air, blood warm carpets, raw
light, deep shadow and sleep at the
colonnaded west facing prayer hall of
the Great Friday Mosque of Sana’a,
Yemen.
Top: Cambridge, 1991.
The organic autumn and machined
textures of the Archie Bunker chair.
Bottom: Kuala Berang, late 1999.
The enveloping humidity, heavy rains

phenomenology as process Bottom: Malaysia, 2004. Moss covered

and burning sun of a tropical monsoon
climate provide all the primary cues
an introduction to intent treads of the gardengate stair evidence the for the formal expression of the
specific context of the monsoon tropics. Terengganu house.

The red carpets lining the floors of the Great
Friday Mosque in Sana’a have the sort of
thickness one has to sleep on during winter to
understand: one sinks but not quite, into the
heavy nap, thick with warm sunlight the texture
of a favourite blanket and the give of plush
velvet. It is much the same for the Punch Bowl
Falls off the Columbia River Gorge, a waterfall
which must be clear jumped in early June to
understand the pure chill of snowmelt, or the
local rock garden trails which I bike during the
monsoons for the taste of fresh flying moss.
I launch myself into the environments I inhabit.
Launching marks my beginnings of familiarity,
the getting-to-know-you, a sharpening of each
particular moment which hones a memory.
Nothing is ever too close for comfort and
perhaps it is a comfort only found from getting
too close.
It is much the same for the work I do in the
context of their origins; context being the
sum total of phenomenological experiences
of any one place, immediate or slightly
more removed. In the way of inclusivity, it is
indeed encompassing; everything which can
be perceived matters. From the viewpoint of
pecularity, it is highly localised: its frame of
reference is something I call specific context.
Climate and site responses are obviously vital,
but as they have been sufficiently written and
theorised on in the way of Critical Regionalism
and only constitute part of deeper, specific
context, they need not be touched on here.
The way in which I interact with my architecture
is total; friends are made of contracts and
contractors, of detritus, building culture,
materials and their manufacture, the act of
use, of maintenance and detail. As friends,
they are less there for the act of building than
for what they intrinsically are, evidenced in the
final product; one chooses not hide the nature
of one’s friends but to discover them over time.
Design becomes less the act of showing than
it does that of revealing; the details of space
and its assembly, of production and elemental
finish. A work observed to be less skilled
through act or appearance is not necessarily
made to change, but is instead given integrity
through the design of its relationship to
its immediate context: the materials and
processes of construction, each understood
for their basic characteristics and specific
applications, find expression in the tectonics of
what is created. And the simple issue of time
passing becomes of essence; that familiarity
and sense of scale which only comes with age
guide my deliberations and decisions as time
has considerably less impact on the quality of
light and space (as volume) than it does on the
materials which reveal them. Architecture as a
process does not end when the building is done,
it barely begins. People age, as do materials
and buildings: I am predisposed not merely to
make their transition as gracious and dignified
as is possible, but to reengage them is ways I
never realised was possible.
In the way different environments encourage
different trajectories for any one particular
launch, so do projects in different geographic
and societal locations instigate different
outcomes of work. Phenomenologically
speaking, a different working context should
breed a different language of work, however
mammoth a task it may prove since a new
langauge is rarely learned nor spoken well
quickly. If an aesthetic pattern of solutions
have begun to emerge from this body of
work, it is because all the work I have done
to this point has been located within the
specific confines of a single place: its points of
which demand the quality of material, context specific to Malaysia, or alternatively,
workmanship and craft commensurate with its specific context. In consequence, the
first world standards, its local building industry architecture which grows from this process
is strewn with inaccuracy as it is with moments engages the patterns of rapid growth and
of precision, curiously spontaneous as it is decay on surfaces, the effects of constant
undemanding, lighthearted in a manner which water flow on and over buildings during the
worries most project managers. monsoons, and the unique problems faced by
maintenance in a deeply humid environment:
It is in this tub of extremes which I design the accumulation of age on surfaces is designed
and build. to be an integral part of the architecture. With
regard to the phenomenology of society, work
Subsequently, the extremes which characterise becomes predisposed to understanding and
Malaysia form the primary cues for the rediscovering ways in which its pecularities
work I do. Its natural and urban ecology and can be given expression; from making the
construction pecularities find imprint on the dining room the centre of a house as is the local
reference are mostly the same, barring products of my design in a process designed culture of food to its people to how footwear
the finer points of site pecularities. The to accommodate rather than avoid. That storage reconfigures the threshold between in
difficulties to be experienced should work in a process is one begun by the identification and out or the way which its driving culture can
different environment be undertaken is beyond of the experiential qualities of the local influence the design of a carpark. It is, however,
comprehension at this time. condition; those physical traces or experiential primarily in materials that the specific
outcomes which give evidence to the unique context of Malaysia finds greatest impact, a
Concerning the place origins of the work character of any one region and place. It collective result of its ecology on surfacess
I have completed, the context of peninsula is these traces and outcomes with which and the unique set of working processes which
Malaysia is an interesting one for a variety I begin design; they form the basis for the characterise its building culture.
of reasons. Ecologically, with the monsoons
bringing torrential driving rains twice a
year, its fluctuating humidity ranging from
swimmable to dead dry and the burning sun so
characteristic of the equatorial tropics, growth
and decay take place at a rate bordering on the
phenomenal. In construction, for a boom which
has lasted the better part of the last ten years,
one finds fine cement dust coating furniture
over the course of a single day and a local
manufacturing industry which is as strong as it
is generally affordable. With respect to society,
for the fact that it is indeed multicultural to
the point of being somewhat confused, an
interesting end has been distilled from its
disparity. And finally, with regard to something
which could be called building culture - for
a country with clients and building projects
 010 011

Bottom: Gardenshell house, mid 2007.
Shoeprint blemishes accidentally created
when errant subcontractors had walked
over floors which had hardened but not
quite chemically set were retained as
traces of the construction biography in
the gardenshell buildings.
Top right: Lightwell house, early 2006.
The narrow wall ledges of the scrapwood
pool, built from left over plywood and
scrap timber, the pool has been designed Drawer pull. Cambridge, early 1991.
for the contiguity of a mining pond, the Side table, American origin, mid 50’s;
texture of stone, the growth of algae and steel hinge pin, Yemeni origin, 1990;
the colour of sea milk. birch twig, New Hampshire, 1990.

With the greater context of our planet as a
finite aggregate of material, it logically follows
that I would rather build economically than
lavishly regardless of place; a belief system
which ultimately prioritises an architecture
of economy over one of aesthetic and
technological opulence. In the process of
attempting to build as such, I have found
bringing clients into complicity with the
process of design of vital importance: it
has become a part of my practice to engage
clients with the act of experimentation. This
is not something to be mistaken with involving
clients with the act of design, as complicity
with experiment carries with it greater moral
investment with a consequent emotional
need for that investment to materialise. That
complicity engages them with the intelligent
search for greater economy of means, a part
of the entire process which has the product
of my work develop its under constructed and
less polished sense of finish. Material selection
is based on the lower cost associated with
commonly found materials, much less in the
way of products manufactured to resist change
and wear than those which evolve best with
weather and through time, finding new life
in the manner of their assembly within the
less than perfect construction culture which
typifies Malaysia. Building errors, when
they inevitably occur and are not found to
compromise structural safety or maintenance
and operational ease, are reconfigured
in aesthetic juxtaposition or contrast to
immediate physical context and left as that
trace of construction biography. This is to say
that the construction error, phenomenologically
processed, is retained as a tactile element of
human and humanising origin. Architecture, in
this case, becomes as much a calculated set of
concepts and theories of space as it is about
the uncertainty of the surfaces which make
them and the processes from which those
same surfaces are made. In such an approach,
the obvious questions of intentionality and
accident inevitably arise, to which an answer
might be given: that architecture, aside from
being that planned execution of strict intention
can also be hardwired for design ambiguity
at its vital surfaces and junctions, developed
as a constant search for opportunity within
that framework of conceptual integrity. For
the conceptual direction of work I do, it is
felt that this approach most closely defines
the meaning of the experiment with regard
to architecture.
It is undeniable that experimentation works
more efficiently when performed at smaller
scales; it is exceedingly difficult to maintain
control over similar issues at increasing
levels of size. Although smallprojects as
an idea was never intended to reference
physical dimensions, the earlier process of
reduction to facilitate understanding clearly
preferenced smaller work and its built work
has been generally small in scale. With larger
commissions currently being constructed, the
application of specific context means that its
working principles must necessarily cross
dimensional scales of reference as validity
of their worth. As to this, only time will tell
if translation can be made successfully. Aside
from the obvious difficulties of design being
more constrained by the public nature of
some of these commissions, the task at hand is
somewhat compounded by the way my practice
has been configured. A decision made at the
beginning of professional practice has led me
to work without the help or the assistance
commonly found in support staff. Sole practice
in this case does indeed mean working entirely
alone. It is not the easiest means to practice
architecture, as working alone can be isolating
at the very least, and time consuming at worst.
However, it has immersed me in a unique set
of circumstances which has inadvertantly
pushed and remoulded the parameters of
work in ways I would not have imagined; the
simplest and most basic issues of management
have found huge impact in the way I design
and formulate ideas: design management
has become a muliti-tasking role of the most
interesting dimensions. It is a common belief
that design and office management occupy
separate categories in the broad scope of
what architecture means. The opposite could
not be more true of solitary practice and
if phenomenology is one’s main priority of
business: design and its management are
completely inter-related if the object of
one’s work is to produce work of constant
exploration. With respect to how it will impact
the outcome of the larger commissions, once
again, only time will tell.
Lastly, it is not possible for one to touch on
process without addressing the issue of whom
one’s clients are. The question here concerns
how much of what we do for and with our
architecture truly impacts all humanity and not
merely the privileged minority; architecture
as we know it being less about the design
of necessities than it is in the production of
luxuries. In as far as the sustainability of
inclusivity is concerned, the work I do will rank
low on the scale of things: clients taken on are
at the very least able to afford to build, and
this places them comfortably in the uppermost
half percent of all people alive. The projects
might be comparatively affordable in relation
to mainstream architecture, but they merely
skim the deeper issues of construction and
technological economy. At best, they currently
form the bare beginnings of inquiry concerning
contextual economy which might yet find
greater application to the grace of living.
Two projects currently in design include a low
cost house for a family of eight with a budget
of thirty thousand Malaysian ringgit (the
equivalent of about 8 300 US dollars or 6 000
euros), and a low to medium cost mass housing
project. These two projects have become
of singular importance to the next chapter
of what smallprojects will be, regardless of
outcome. The project for the family of eight
in particular, points a fresh direction in what
constitutes necessity: the sophistication shown
by the client (the chauffeur of another client)
not merely in recognising and requesting what
he favoured aesthetically as architecture,
but more in the sacrifice of other pressing
necessities regarding that decision. The
responsibility of the architectural commission
in this case takes on new significance.
In summary, the thinking and making of
architecture as it engages the specific context
of place which surround it, are the formal
elements of inquiry with regards to the work
in this book. Its contents aim to reveal and
clarify the design and development of built
work which has grown from the perceived
and experiential qualities of its particular
context.
The book’s structure consequently engages the
duality of product and process: it begins with a
collection of essays written by way of discourse
and critique on a variety of issues, mostly
architectural in nature. While it is usually the
case that one is either a critic or a practitioner
and not both, I have found it important to my
development in design to write and to make
personal judgements on issues which I believe
to be more or less relevant to the way we
live, work and create. This section documents
much of what has become a working process
for design and the complex art of building.
The second part of the book documents built
work and projects from early ideas to that
more consistent with the underlying principles
on a process guided by phenomenology.
Attempt has been made for the architectural
work documented in this section to be
substantiatively descriptive; aside from
the drawings and explanations behind
specific details, the floor plans which allow
organisational relationships to be understood
also double as the means to show how design
documentation is practiced. The intentions
here are to reveal as much as possible the
workings and methods of a particular practice,
such that the deeper relationships between
process and product may be more clearly
understood and critiqued.
The appendices at the end of the book include
a select record of academic work followed by
formative projects over the first ten corporate
years with a large architectural firm. It is my
belief that such documentation, however brief,
provides essential background to a process of
phenomenological thinking and greater insight
to the evolution of that process with regards
to a particular body of work.
 012 013

Left: Muneng Mayangan, Nov. 2003. The progress of a society is typically

The walls of a typical contemporary gauged through its awareness and
Javanese kampung house have their application of knowledge as defined
brick walls constructed prior to the and dictated by rational processes
pouring of concrete stiffeners. and the formality and history of high

the principle of specific context

Right: Musée Orsay, June 2004.
The technology of digital mapping as
it is commonly used for restorations
and reproductions in the European
Museum.
culture.
A process based on phenomenology
presupposes the rational discovery
notes on phenomenological relevance
of phenomena, governed only by
specificity of place.

Every single thing in existence is shrink

wrapped in its unique dense weave of
relationships which we call its context.
Problem solving is dependent on the ability
to grasp the contextual weave surrounding any
one issue: the knowledge a guerilla must have
concerning the nature of his operational terrain
is as contextually driven as the information a
stockbroker requires to make decisions
offering the greatest positive economic impact.
The greater degree of complexity the problem,
the deeper must one converse with the weave
of its particular context for informed decision
making and heightened intuition. Knowledge
and its application as wisdom is contextual.
Creativity and its application as design is no
different.

Design is the conversation between creativity

and context.

Architectural context most basically refers to

site geography, local building bylaws, the high
tension line or twenty storey building next
door. It is about where the sun rises and sets or
where prevailing winds blow. For the diligent
architect, it will concern budget contraints
and the relevance of use. However, design
relevance works at much deeper levels through
the consideration of specific context. Specific
context concerns the rational discovery of
natural and human phenomena revealed
through the specificity of place. It is about how
the surrounding desert environment of Karachi
coats buildings, leaves, food and people with
fine dust over the course of each day. About the
seven different shades of natural green in East
Java by way of texture and sunlight and the
way humidity in the monsoon tropics buckle the
pages of hardcover books and cause constant
staining of glazed curtain walled buildings
downtown. It is about how the dry cold of a
temperate climate will deform and split timber
from a humid equatorial region and about the
storm drains in Singapore which collect water
run-off with vastly different consequences
from those in Malaysia. Understanding specific
context is about perceiving intelligently
about the subtle effects of geography, society
and culture in any one particular place. It
is as much about any one society’s attitude
to garbage as it is about the reasons why
orange coloured lichen grows on the boughs
of raintrees in Singapore and not in Kuala
Lumpur with barely two degrees of latitude
between them. It is about the way the
phenomenology of perception can inspire
relevant design.
Specific context also applies to the way any
one country or construction region traditionally
and also most commonly builds, about which
materials and processes have best adapted
over time functionally and economically
in specific locations and about which new
imported technologies and materials actually
constitute relevance. The specific context of
building culture is about the peculiarity of ways
in which any one construction society operates,
measures and monitors itself, from the way
brick walls might be laid to how shuttering
is erected. It is as subtle and as pervasive as
a weather system and is bound to a constant
state of slow evolution. Understanding specific
context invites the questioning of dominant
paradigms within which a society operates.
It celebrates diffference as it dismantles
ubiquity.
If design is indeed the conversation between
creativity and context, then specific context is
that which births specific design.
014 015

essays

on principles and design

016 the garden room
the landscaped plinth
017 the epic landscape
mountain pool
dogconcrete w r i t i n g
018 underconstruction style
andy goldsworthy
019 low cost
earthed
renovation
020 safari roof
fengshui
021 smallprojects
the detail sketch

on reality and practice

028 no compromise
descending angels
scandinavian style
029 scapegoat
professional fees
030 schedule of fees
integrity
031 A4
032 the architecture of engineering
033 the high cost of value

the dogma of economics

034 product and process
commodity
035 third world
ubiquity
 024
Fig. 6 to 10 - details for a hung stair to show how
structural concerns distilled from understanding
immediate use result in steel locking hasps at the tops
and bases of the steel tension rods; the consequence
of required structural support and construction
adjustment in a single direction.
In the consideration of a detail, static or animate, four issues are of critical and concurrent importance.
These are, in order of priority:
1. The nature of its immediate use.
2. The degree of its exposure to heat, cold and/or moisture.
3. The ease of its function and continued maintenance.
4. The nature of its finish or appearance.
While it is most common and indeed essential to find the first three issues attended to, it is actually the
last which provides new understanding to the act of detailing. This is not to say that a detail elegant
in appearance is worth its salt if it does not perform as it should; a well researched atypical finish or
appearance of a detail is simply that which marks it apart from more commercial ones. Floor skirtings
are intended to hide the joint between floor and wall: steel channels for a groove line where a typical
skirting should be might look crisp and contemporary but will never disguise the bruising of a vacuum
head or the streaks of a mop stain.
The first issue in the process of detail design sets the tone and informs the next three. Understanding
the nature of a detail’s immediate use is definitive: is it to keep rainwater from staining the corner
of a window reveal? Will a pivot door be expected to hide the view beyond through the little gaps on
its sides? Does the stair handrail fit well to the human grasp at the same time it is securely mounted?
At a deeper and more refined level of research, the nature of immediate use can be sought through a
consideration of the banal and have questions asked of the ordinary: where is the best mounting surface
for a toilet roll holder? What is the most comfortable way of emerging from a swimming pool? How
does one most naturally use a basin tap? What makes the most efficient location for elevator cab button
panel? The simple example of airport seating tells one that it performs less the function of general rest
than it does that of providing relief for legs and feet; the question then is what constitutes the most
appropriate height for the waiting seats at airport gates, given the dual need for elevating the legs
and preparing oneself for boarding? When given deeper thought, the processing of design detail turns
into the anticipation of the unexpected. The nature of immediate use is never something to be simply
assumed nor taken lightly (see fig.6 to 10).
025
The consideration of moisture, heat and cold with respect to detail design are but specific situations
regarding the nature of immediate use of a detail, but in as far as they determine essential functions of
a building’s operation, they are absolutely vital. Having a window or roof in the tropics to keep moisture
and heat gain out is as basic to design thinking as the computer is to production: in as far as roofing sheets
have to lap and double glazing is essential for insulation against cold, details may bore once again rather Fig. 11 to 13 - a sketch exploring the raw function
than excite, but the difference can still be made through the same attention paid to the understanding of a gutter support; the need for adjustability in one
of how air moves, water collects or drips and how heat is transmitted (see fig.11 to13). The reinvention direction, constructional tolerance in two orthogonal
of such details are facilitated by an analysis of how existing technologies or materials function and and one radial direction.
where they fail and through an understanding of how our world physically functions. However, extreme
care must be taken in the design of these mostly technical details as failure might not involve mere
rectification but sequential damage. The classic example of sequential damage would be the case of an
incorrectly detailed skylight which leaks rainwater into a museum or gallery causing possible damage
to architecture and furnishings and potentially irreplaceable damage to the artwork.
Fig. 14 to 15 - a detail for the enclosure of a tall
living room volume: the function of garden parties
necessitated doors which would disappear when
required for better spatial flow. Roller shutters were
The ease with which a detail functions or is maintained is tied generally to its longevity, although it specified for the task and a detail had to be designed
will have specific relevance to animate detail. Whether it is in the form of a grease nipple to allow such that the large ungainly housing boxes for the
roller shutter could be tucked away from view and
for the lubrication of moving parts or the ubiquitous odour trap (the removable top cover of a typical serviced without need for entry to the interior of the
floor trap to contain sewer odour with a water seal), the functioning and maintenance of a detail is house. The detail was sketched at structural inception
itself dependant on its exposure to moisture and air, the combination of which can lead to localised in order to hide the equipment without losing the
rust and damage to the surround or internals of the detail (see fig.14 to 15). On occasion, a detail may impression of a clean concrete shell on the exterior.
028
on reality and practice
no compromise I have been told that the romance years end with graduation from university. It is understandably easier
for those with lineage or patrons to facilitate the pursuit of an uncompromised present. But for the
dream filled graduate seeking that first job with nothing but a degree in the kit, the real world will pull
the brightest star right down to earth.
For anyone who dreams, there is a recognition to make.
Intellect comes in two forms: there are floaters and there are divers. The floaters generally grow into
pinstriped suits and have corporate ambitions, they may or not change the world but the one thing they
strive for above all else is independence through economic gain. Taken to the extreme, a floater will
choose to live in the world of purchasing power; a world of monetary survival. Divers live in a world
of their economic making. Reality will bite, but in a way of their choosing and their uncompromised
present depends not on a safety net of money but of passion. Divers live the less worn path not by choice
but as a byproduct of their beliefs. They are the same deep rollers Dr. Lecter speaks of in reference
to Clarice Starling. Taken to the extreme, divers are eccentric and difficult, they have been known to
cut their ears off.
I have since found that with divers and deep rollers, real life does not end the romance, it begins it.
It may come in uncompromised form only years later, but the journey will always be worth its while.
Divers are a special breed, for they dream. The key is to keep that dream alive...and when reality bites,
to bite right back.
descending angels We had a wonderful game back in the last office I worked in. Very much like the vivid vintage Hindi
movies of old. If you will remember, they usually started out with a neat family, slowly worn down by
the unfairness of life, disease, president incumbents or evil landlords. Then, stricken by a polluted evil,
the eldest son gets drawn into a life of crime, leaving his weary mother to care for the hobbled father
and grandmother gone insane. The storm clouds gather, crops ravaged and just as the deluge and hail
are about to cast a final tragedy on the gathered gloom, the cherubic Hindu god with beetling eyebrows
and googlie eyes drops from the sky and saves the day.
That was the game we played, the God Game.
The trick was for the director of the firm, the headman, the proprieter of the shop, to be above it all.
Clean and disassociated from daily happenings job to job. That’s the way it worked in the office; I was
a frontliner, a footsoldier and wrestler sent out to wage the war of design gives and design takes. Never
conceeding a cause just because the client held the say so, fighting to the last design breath under the
task of keeping to budget’s simply because you believed in what you did. And when the final confrontation
happened, when clients got pissed off not being able to make headway with their unreason, then the
director of the firm would descend like an angel of reason, translucent, peaceful and godlike, an entity
of objectivity to take away the client’s pain. ‘These young impetuous architects’, he’d say, ‘passionate
and just burning to do the best possible work’. Yes, the best work. Passionate. Just burning. What client
could possibly argue with that?
Descending angels and passion. Takes one through storm clouds and polluted evil.
scandinavian style The world of professional architecture tends to bifurcate at some unpleasant juncture during the course
of all projects. On the one hand, one has the holy grail of design; the knit of space and technology,
passion and practicality, client wants and client needs, building bylaws and creative possibility. On the
other, one will find the living hell of seeking authority approvals.
029
I have been led to believe that the Scandinavians run things differently up North. When it comes to the
process of building submissions and authority approvals, our Viking counterparts have an interesting way
of providing for accountability, check and balance. Authority submissions, for all intents and purposes,
are taken care of by a professional collection of people; individuals not necessarily trained as architects
but with all the required skills to produce submission drawings and the know how to liaise with those
in charge. Leaving architects to do what they should be doing best, design. Not shunting between
departments for stamps of receipt nor patiently sitting in lobbies for appointments on issues already
seen to, not learning delivery boyhood.
It is simple really; full authority submissions are detrimental to the design of good work by virtue of
lost design time. So let us rid ourselves of peripherals and start focussing on the design of good working
buildings. I think Scandinavian style works best.
A scapegoat is a blametaker. Some of the greatest scapegoats ever were the creations of consultants. scapegoat
Generally speaking, consultants create scapegoats over their making of inappropriate design decisions
or to cover just plain incompetence.
Before implementation, the consultants scapegoats of choice are the requirements.
During implementation, the consultants scapegoat of choice is the contractor.
After implementation, the consultants scapegoat of choice is the client.
It is possible to verify the absolute authenticity of a scapegoat. As such, the mastery of scapegoat
creation lies in the ability of the consultant to leave as cloudy a trace as is possible concerning their
involvement through the use of heavy rhetoric: to divert attention by drawing attention. Though other
tongues are used, English is the language of choice among consultants, both foreign and local, concerning
the introduction and damning of a scapegoat. The nuances and ambiguities of the English language are
most suited for the art of scapegoat finding. Be alert for subtleties! Be an exemplary listener and speak
excellent English. Ask yourself, am I a consultant or will I meet one later today?
It bothers me that under the form of contracts here in Malaysia that architects charge a fee equivalent professional fees
to a percentage of the final construction costs. That percentage sum varies depending on building type
and degree of repetition if modular, but there it is. And should the final construction cost rise with
higher specifications on architectural materials, finishes or fittings, it is reflected as a subsequent rise
in the percentage fee.
The concept of conflicting interests could never be more clearly defined.
Logically now. It means that the specifier stands to collect extra on an increase in cost of something
specifed. And, this being architecture, everything which ends as a specification is simply justified in the
name of aesthetics. The absolute beauty of the system is its sheer audacity....clients and lay people are
simply not trained to question ‘professional’ opinion on aesthetics or be criticised. Simply brilliant.
It is apparent that a new way of working professional fees is left wanting, the current system being
inherited from the British notwithstanding. I propose a fee structure which may be left to each
architect to decide: the proviso is that every fee structure be absolutely up front, no hidden costs and
agendas, and presented in a final sum which does not change from the moment the contract is signed
and sealed. Variations based on revision of design not instigated by the architect through foresight or
lack thereof may then be charged a fee based on the extent of the change, be it square footage, detail
or design layout.
036 037

projects

1. early projects
043 safari roof house
079 ventblock house
089 louvrebox house

2. lightwell house
117 lightwell house w o r k
159 loftoffice

3. the gardenshell buildings

175 BritishIndia corporate warehouse
209 gardenshell house
227 gardenwall offices

4. small projects
277 dining table #3
279 steel table
281 bath valet
283 timber table
285 black and white cabinets
287 onion valet
289 wallpantry
291 kitchen jockey
295 pittsburgh desk
297 mule workstation system
299 autopsy table

5. catalysts
303 brickwall house
307 black and white house
315 dogconcrete house
323 sibu pavilion
329 boardformed house
335 aviary house/folded stair
038 039

1
early projects
The projects undertaken in sole practice began
with three houses. All three houses were
sited in gated communities, part of a growing
trend among the privileged in Malaysia
underpinned by the psychological need for
physical security.

These early houses embodied explorative rather

than fully formed ideas about architecture and,
like the projects worked on over the first ten
years of professional practice (see appendix
ii), regarded tangible hypothesizing and the
testing of ideas in built form a necessary part
of construction at that particular point in time:
they benefitted from the grace and patience
of clients who were less interested in the
product than they were in the process. These
clients showed a keeness for detail which
questioned their own assumptions about how they
lived and placed value in the experiment as much
as they were forgiving of an idea gone wrong.

The complexity and struggle of any architecture

lies in the attempts to amalgamate a vast
number of disciplines. The work done in
school and the start of any professional
career can only ever focus on bringing form
to each discipline independently of how well
the others might dovetail. Taken separately,
each project in this section reflects a time
of experimentation and coming to terms
with each diverse facet of architecture
independently rather than understood and
designed in consolidation as built reality
in a single work. This section is about the
beginnings prior to engaging deeper complexity.

The projects documented here are complete as

individual concepts but they find grouping with The forest plantation grove looking
the development of a primary idea governing south down its length to the dining
their design: that of the safari roof. room at the safari roof house.
040 041

safari roof house

kuala lumpur, malaysia 2003-05

The safari roof house is located on a rise

on the edge of the greens of a surburban
neighbourhood golf course, built for a
family of five. The site, being wider than
deep, allowed for building orientation which
maximized frontage to the borrowed greens
of the east facing course. A forest grove
centres the house, a garden room of ten
feet by forty five feet with a plantation of
thirty six trees in eight different species
filling a large long ashtray disguised as a
gravel compound to accommodate frequent
parties, cigarette butts and the act of
camouflage.

The narrative for the house did not have its

garden designed around the architecture.
Rather, its architecture began with the
garden.

The house is entered through a perforated

gate which folds away from an awaiting
visitor at the doorbell, along a gravelwashed
driveway and up a short flight of stairs to a
large pivoted middle earth door. This door
for ceremony opens to a view of a cement
rendered pool and the landscape beyond
screened by the trees of the forest grove
and ashtray garden. The rooms of the house
are arranged around and are themselves
screened by the east facing grove. The west
sides of the house are shaded by large walls
of precast cement ventblock: an economic
means to reduce afternoon heating from
the west and to provide for greater privacy The forest grove of the safari roof
in the bathrooms. The finishes within are house; a plantation of trees of a mixed
all variations on the common material of variety of species, the courtyard was
designed to provide morning shade for
cement, from polished floors and rendered the tall space of the living room and a
walls to plywood formed concrete ceilings vertical foreground to the landscape
and black bathroom floors. beyond.
060 061
Left: The tall living room is lit by
clerestory window walls and shaded
from the direct light of the morning
sun by the lower verandah roof slab
and the forest grove.

Opposite page:
Top left: The ventilation block
elevation on the west face of the living
room keeps the warmest aspects of the
afternoon sun away from the glazed
window wall within. Sections of the
window wall slide open for through
ventilation and cleaning and sunlight
begins to filter through during the late
afternoons with a greatly reduced heat
by then, and only fully over sunset, with
a deep riot of shadows and mottled
pools of light.

Top right: The tall volume of the

living room allows for large clerestory
windows above for ventilation and the
sense of the encroaching greens from
outside.

Bottom: The living room viewed

through the trees of its forest grove
from the pool deck to the east.
The trees in the grove include local
pelong and jelutong, koompassia
excelsa, caesalpinia ferrea, alstonia
angustiloba, tristania obovata, hopea
odurata and jacaranda obtusifolia.
 066
Top: First concept sketches for the
house, with the safari roofs shown
lifted off the body of the building
masses. The lower sketch indicates
the extent to which the timber lapped
ceiling below the roof would be taken,
leaving the periphery and eaves of the
roofing sheets unfinished and exposed
to view.
Bottom row: Preliminary sectional
detail sketches of the safari roof and
the method of its construction. These
were subtly modified and adjusted
in the built outcome but the basic
intentions of a steel fascia to hide
the corrugated roof edge and the
roof cross section without insulation
remained unchanged.
067
Right: View showing where the roof
eave meets its timber panelled ceiling.
A plastic rodent mesh was designed
into the gap between the ceiling and
its roof to keep birds and rats from
building nests within the separation.
Bottom: The safari roof from the
west; shed like in simplicity, the single
crucial aspect of its function rests
in the expression of the clear space
between body of building and upper
roof. Where many roofs commonly
found on contemporary houses in
Southeast Asia seal the gap with the
fixed glazing of a purely aesthetic
nature, the safari roof expresses the
separation as an uninterrupted gap of
cross ventilated air.

The safari roof house uses, as its namesake,

a roof originally found on the series Land
rovers from the seventies: a simple sunbreak
roof sheet held off the body of the vehicle
by small feet. Where typical cars use a high
performance insulative layer in their roofs,
the safari roof substitutes technology for cross
ventilated wind in its version of tropical heat
insulation, a heat best known for its degree
of humidity. For the house, the steel supports
were made taller for better air flow and simply
mounted onto the concrete frame at roof level.
The client's wish for timber panelled eaves
was abstractly provided for by way of timber
strips mounted beneath the safari roof in a
single broad panel but held away from the roof
edges: flourescent tubes brighten the timber
ceiling at night, for the effect of lightness and
the visual experience of what the roof actually
does in reality.
104 105
Left: The upper louvred box of
bedrooms was lifted off the ground
by concrete columns and the area
beneath designed with sliding glass
doors; being open from one boundary
wall to the next, the space of the
garden effectively became that of the
living room and the living room was
perceptually extended the full width
of the site.

Opposite page:
Top left: The Terengganu house; typical
in form of the traditional houses
on the north eastern coast of West
Malaysia, they have been built for
the specific context of an equatorial
monsoon climate. Constructed of
timber, it insulates against the heat
of the equatorial sun. Raised off the
ground for the height of a near full
storey, it avoids the ground dampness
and the floods of the monsoon season
while providing space beneath for
the storing of boats and the mending
of fishing nets and the drying of fish
during the drier months. The openable
walls of the raised domicile and
louvred ends of its roof provide good
air flow not merely through the house,
but underneath and above it as well
to dry out whatever moisture might
be collected on its timber surfaces.
Understood from the viewpoint of
available materials and context, the
Terengganu house is a perfect example
of cross ventilated grace.

Right column: Early sketches studying

the louvrebox house as a raised and
louvred mass: the area beneath was
conceived as a ‘room’ across the full
width of the site and contained only by
the boundary garden walls and given
shade by the house above it. Where
the undercroft of the Terengganu
house found use in the drying of fish
and for storage, the undercroft of the
louvrebox house conceives its use as a
plinth for the everyday; for the grace
of gathering and cooking, eating,
lounging, pool parties and afternoon
naps.

Bottom left: Morning light filtering

through the louvred screens and into
the corridors which circulate to the
bedrooms on the uppermost level.
116
lightwell house
The lightwell house holds an important place
in the work done by smallprojects less for the
fact that it is where design work physically
takes place than that the house and its design
elements, features and loose ends runs threads
of influence and continuity through almost
every other project undertaken. Aside from
being simply a place to live, it has grown with
its loftoffice to become a workshop and test
bed for built ideas, concepts and materials,
a proving ground for design as it engages the
garden and the context of monsoon Asia. It
is where most ideas of the practice are first
birthed, see construction and final study: trees
and various forms of planting are constantly
being added and removed to the spaces within
and fully scaled contructs in entirety or part
all serve to help the understanding of how
natural elements and manmade things age
and, more critically, of how nature ages on and
with the manmade. The lightwell house is in
a state of evolution, both through the process
of continuing renovation and rebuilding and
by way of aging as it takes to its garden; a
reference library for the study of change.
The meeting of the raw materials at
the entry courtyard of the lightwell
house: a construction idiom of clay
brick and cement, concrete and gravel
for ground cover, moss growth, shadow
and light.
117
2
Spatially, the house has been subject to
experimentation to blur the readings between
inside and out. The cumulative effect tests
the various experiences regarding the effect
of entry in the strategising and fine tuning of
perceived thresholds, territories, borders and
strongholds. Where spatial value has been
more commonly understood to be mostly
derived from light and its revealing of visual
tactile quality, the design explorations on the
lightwell house, having prioritised the details
of function equally with that volume making,
have found the subtler working details to
contribute as much and more to perceived
spatial quality. The manner with which details
work and are used, locking hasps slide and
doors close, pivot, hinge or latch are all part
of the less known realm of animate detail
which engage our bodies more fully, placing
our powerful, if phenomenologically limited
sense of sight into balanced perspective. The
lightwell house is about the scale of time as
it is traced on solids and surfaces and the
details of use and occupation which animate
space and form.
128 129
Top: The entry courtyard just past
the cantilever gate; conceived as a
threshold between the garage and
front porch, it accommodates the
arrival of guests by way of a garden
and mottled pools of sunlight. Across
from the garage and at the end of the
courtyard is an angled porch and the
main entry sliding slat door.

Bottom: The entry porch marks

a point of decision, through the
sliding slat door to the garden room
of the residence beyond or up the
cantilevered stair treads on the right
to an office gate entrance above. The
angular form of the porch derives from
the geometry of the site and lends
itself to the natural progression of
entry at the deepest point of its cover.

Top: The slat door with evening

shadows in semi opened position
tucked away and protected from the
elements at the deepest corner of the
porch. The door slides towards the
house to allow unimpeded perceptual
continuity of the boundary wall on the
right when opened.

Bottom left: Inceptual sketches for the

slat door in exploration of a latching
mechanism which could be padlocked
from inside or outside with visual
privacy and security, both commonly
sacrificed with an opening with which
to physically access the padlock.
Simply put, most padlocks can be
picked from the outside; the slat door
was designed to keep the padlock
secure when all were home asleep.

Bottom right: Detail sketches to study

the dynamics of supporting the slat
door and the design of construction of
its timber slats such that its method
of assembly would be hidden from
scrutiny. Aside from some ideas on
how the wheels would be expected to
be constructed, the sketch also shows
offset slats on either side which details
a alternating slat assembly one side to
the next.
 161
The gardengate viewed from the
east; simple in form and sufficiently
prominent in size to draw the attention
of clients to as an entrance, its
transparency became vital in order to
avoid its becoming too obtrusive. It has
been designed to become dressed with
ficus pumila over time, at which time it
will begin to resemble what its name
suggests; that of a gate with a garden
woven through it.

Opposite page:
Top and middle left: Inceptual and
dimensioned drawings detailing the
relationship between the cantilevered
steps to the gardengate.

Bottom left: Sectional and detail

drawings to study the operational
dynamics of the trapdoor with its
lever door counterweight. The animate
detail was based on balance points,
swing angles, sequencing of the
moving parts and the coordination of
associated functions.

Centre top two: Design sketches and

studies to determine tolerances and
raw dimensions for the gate.

Centre bottom two: The latching

system for the gardengate required
sequencing the closure of the trapdoor
with its lever door counterweight;
the smaller arc of movement for the
narrower side of the pivotted trapdoor
allowed it to swing into position
marginally before the larger arc of
the counterweight edge, thereby
permitting passage of the sliding
bolts on either side of the lever door
through bolt holes in the trapdoor edge
for a secure lock.

Right column: The gardengate in

closed position in the top picture and
in opened position below. The idea was
to have the security of a handrail when
the stair was in use and to have the
stair treads kept clean and free of the
clutter which commonly accompanies
a handrail with typical stairs. It was
simply logical that the trapdoor floor
of the gardengate would serve the
function of handrail as well.
172
the gardenshell buildings
While the safari roof houses established
building context as an essential part of
construction design, the one question it had
not addressed was one of greater economy,
something which forms the basis of any process
of value. The gardenshell series of buildings
began in response to the growing need for
an aesthetic associated with increasing the
economy of construction, reducing the finish
of any building to its absolute simplest raw
element and allowing textural quality to merge
more readily with that of the garden. Together
with consideration given to the aesthetic
handling of services, structural and enclosure
systems and integrating the processes of site
management, they mark the beginnings of a
proper amalgamation of the diverse aspects
of the architectural profession.
The first project undertaken as a gardenshell
building was the BritishIndia Corporate
warehouse, although the idea was only fully
formed with the gardenshell house, a carcass
of unfinished cement brick and plywood formed
concrete and a cheaper corrugated cement
sheet version of the safari roof; a working
development itself on the dogconcrete house.
In the gardenshell buildings, what became
of primary importance was not merely how
the building looked as it weathered and more
of how much weather it allowed through
its walls in its unfinished state. Common
wall finishes such as cement plaster and
weathershield paint do more than merely
provide a substrate for the processes of aging;
they form the first line of defence against the
rigors of a monsoonal climate, against the
capillary action of water through brick and
the gradual accumulation of mould as a result
of dampness. The gardenshell buildings had to
handle that balance of low cost, practicality,
elemental protection and growth accretion
on its exterior walls to aesthetic effect and
in extreme cases, they took on a porous and
173
3
unwholesomely cheap cement brick for full
brick walls without external finish and these
suffered a degree of moisture penetration,
blistering the paintwork on small areas
on the interior. In these cases, the growth
of ficus pumila creepers on the external
walls have effectively prevented further
moisture intrusion and repainted internal
walls no longer show signs of water intrusion.
Other paradigm shifts for the purposes of
construction economy include studying various
proportions of cement and sand mixtures
in search of the perfect unpolished cement
rendered floor. Aside from the collective
adjustments to specifications from handmade
tapware to subtle reductions in timber frames
and trims, the idea for the safari roof was
adopted in most of the gardenshell houses. It
remained unchanged in principle but put on
a truly spartan diet: steel sizes and sections
were trimmed to a minimum tolerance and
the bituminous roofing sheets were replaced
by cheaper cementitous corrugated board.
Reduced to minimal finishes and tolerances,
the gardenshell buildings would challenge the
limits of aesthetic acceptability.
In the automotive industry, it is common to
find variations of any one particular model
produced as a lightweight ‘performance'
limited edition, with acoustic deadening and
heavier frills removed and components from
exhaust systems to windows and door handles
replaced with lighter materials; all with
significant mark up in price as compared to
the cost of the base model. The gardenshell
buildings could be thought of in the same
light, but with the vital difference of economy
in mind; changes and fine tuning done for Left: Shoeprint blemishes accidentally
greater efficiency, lower cost and aesthetic created when errant subcontractors
maintainability. The gardenshell buildings had walked over floors which had
hardened but not quite chemically
represent a collective attempt to reevaluate set were retained as traces of the
modern corporate aesthetics and to define an construction biography in the greyroom
architecture of economy and grace. offices.
202
The wash trough for the staff toilets:
fashioned after the wash areas in
preindustrial slaughterhouses, the
idea was to capture the lean and
mean world of merchandising and the
clothing industry in the form of an
altar for the ritualistic act of cleansing.
203
The urinal was designed as a upmarket
take on the act of pissing by a
backlane wall; tempered glass panes
protect while they allow the texture
of the wall behind to show through.
Copper pipes and brass valves bring
flush water to the glass face.
224 225

gardenwall offices (pjtc)

petaling jaya, malaysia 2006-09

The gardenwall offices began as a request

for an alternative proposal to the typical
office block development: one which could
accommodate close to a million square feet
and be different enough to be hip. It was a
difficult proposition to begin with since the
glass office tower, being grown of western
roots, has succeeded globally for the exact
reason of its ubiquity and sameness from
Dubai to Dublin: corporate entities attract
economic investment and gain clout and
credibility by buying into first world
aesthetics, technology and culture.

The project began with the questioning of

commonly held beliefs concerning the office
building; a dismantling of western concepts
and the evaluation of a tropical monsoon
paradigm. To begin with, it was determined
that every office space in the project would
be designed with the option for natural
cross ventilation should air conditioning
not be desired; the spaces within had to
be actually pleasant and comfortable to
work in with only the use of ceiling fans for
which a relatively shallow building width
was designed. Secondly, the building had to
be cheap to construct in relation to typical
office buildings: for the kind of rawness
which was envisioned, the principles of
detail management would not be more
seriously tested nor would the specification
of finishes for a grade A office more likely Opposite: A section of the east screen
questioned than in this project. Finally, with wall of the gardenshell offices; spare,
unadulterated, monolithic, imperfect
all the requirements of natural ventilation, and unapologetic in scale, it is that
functionality and construction economy in ‘skin’ the building is covered by, an
mind, the office had to be a gardenshell elevation born of highway billboards
building, one designed to be predominantly and the strategy to conceal wide
self maintaining and aesthetically elegant expanses of glass from view, putting
the responsibility of cleaning glass
as it weathers with the violent grace of surfaces on occupants; self sufficiency
tropical humidity. being the case in point.
274 275

4
small projects
In the thinking of what smallprojects was all
about, it was recognised there existed a little
matter of semantics which required definition.
To begin with, there is smallprojects, which is
simply the name chosen for the practice. With
its highlighted first syllable, smallprojects
specifically describes the focus of the practice;
in the way the elements of any one design
are physically and philosophically joined and
how those joints are about specific contextual
relations in function or through physical
proximity. Ultimately, its meaning also extends
to the organisation of its professional practice,
and how the subtlest decisions of management
could also impact the way an architecture is
ultimately conceived. In essence, the deeper
sense of the term came to refer to a more
encompassing definition of deep context.

This section of the book however, has to do with

the most basic use of the expression, which is in
reference to work which is small in scale.

For the most part, the small projects began it

all, those little exercises in rethinking what
something was meant for and if it could be
designed any better. The following projects
examine different kinds of ideas: some
are technical, being rooted in structural or
constructional concerns while others are about
the functioning and use of utility elements.
Then again, some will simply be about a
reexamination of aesthetics regarding the
everyday. The range of small here is wide,
since small taken to a deeper level reveals
whole new layers for development which can
be profoundly illuminating. Mostly, the projects
here are the ones designed generally enough
not to belong in any one specific project: they
may have been part of an idea contained in
any one of the larger works but manage to
The autopsy conference table; spartan-
stand well enough in other contexts to hold
like, its design was one reduced and
their own. Context here grew from a pure honed to structural minimalism for the
exploration of use and fabrication. lean task of project postmortems.
276
The table was designed around a set
of opposing forces with the use of its
steel tensioning rods. The success of
its structural integrity rests solely on
the trueness of fit of each timber joint
between the frameset and each leg;
the steel rods only serving to compress
each joint to hold them in place. The
legs were tapered from each joint to
their feet to lighten the mass at the
furthest point from the connection
and subsequently reduce the moment
experienced at that joint. Little rubber
feet at the head of each leg hold the
glass top in place.
Top and bottom left: Table corner
showing the resolution of forces in
one of two typical joints. Further
refinement will see metal facing
plates finish the joint between the
nuts, threaded end of each rod and the
timber corner. Aside from capping the
joint, it will serve as a compressive
plate which will keep the timber
corner from crushing then the table
has been tensioned.
Bottom centre and right: The lapped
opposing steel rods in tension.
Where the original table#1 focussed
the highest compressive forces
and subsequent clutter of physical
material at the centre of the table,
table#3 placed all the same forces
on the periphery, focussing them to
point locations and reducing the once
crowded centre to all of three cross
lapped rods.
Opposite page: View of the table leg
with its opposing sets of steel tensioning
rods; two across a diagonal of the table
and one in between and tangential to
the first two.
277
dining table #3
steel, timber and tempered glass
Dining table #3 was the last of three tables
designed and built based on steel tensioning
to lock timber joints in compression.
The series of tables was first begun in
graduate school with the use of scrap pine
lumber salvaged from packing crates, a
softer wood best suited for the give which
compressive forces put on the joints. As early
experiments, the first two tables utilised
standard full sawn timber members straight
off the shipping pallets they were pulled
from. Without any shaping or carpentry
work, the tables in finished form took on
the chunky industrial character of their
material origins. In this third incarnation
of exploring structural limits, an elegance
of design and form absent in the earlier two
was the focus.
With the tropical hardwood timber of red
balau, an alternative method had to be
devised for the way the timber members met,
since the sheer density of the grain would
not permit gentle crushing and subsequent
good contact at the joints. Slender pieces
of timber tapering to delicate feet were
shaped, thickest at the uppermost end
where the forces of cross tensioning were
felt most. The timber frameset was raised
close to the glass top and out of the way
of seated thighs, with the simplest of cross
halved joints used wherever the timber side
frames met, and sized to a depth of three
inches over their four foot span to take the
loads of cross bracing. With the three steel
tension rods in place, two parallel on one
diagonal and one slid betwen them on the
opposing diagonal, the table achieved a
grace and refinement quite different from
its thuggish predecessors.
298
Top left: Unlike concrete slab
cantilevers which have the benefit of
structural mass for its anchored side, a
concrete wafer table had to derive its
structural schema almost entirely from
its ability to support its weight at mid
span. The autopsy table compounded
this task with the self imposed need
for the slenderness of one and a half
inch steel angle legs.
Middle and bottom left: The solution
came in the form steel rods in tension
which crossed exactly at mid span
to support a quarter inch thick steel
T beam which in turn holds up the
concrete wafer. The steel beam tapers
towards either side of the table where
support is less needed and to hide the
means of support from view.
299
Right column: The tensile forces were
pulled to threaded ends of each rod
and cylindrical anchors welded to each
corner at the exact junction where
the framing angles meet, isolating the
resultant compressive forces within the
frame and allowing the legs the luxury
of merely bringing gravity loads to
their ugly little adjustable feet.
autopsy table
mild steel and concrete.
During the construction of the greyroom,
the client informed of the need for a
conference table over which he could
conduct project meetings, management
sessions and postmortems.
Postmortems.
The idea developed for a table where
hardcore postmortems could really be
conducted, one with the demeanour and
hard austerity of a clinical slab for medical
examinations. The autopsy table was
designed to a length of twelve feet, a width
of five and a thickness of an inch and a half.
Its frame and legs were made of mild steel
angles welded with grace of a railroad
worker.
The inceptual sketch which began the
table had the singular aim of putting a
concrete wafer on legs.
300 301

5
catalysts
The practice of architecture will inevitably
result in the production of some work which
will defy categorisation by virtue of their
anomaly and might appear to lack sufficient
critical worth to warrant documentation.
Insubstantial as these projects might appear,
each one in actuality carries genetic markers,
important traces of what commonly become
generating ideas for later work; the seeds
of more critically formed projects to come.
In as far as the finer points of a philosophy
of design could be measured, these projects
are of considerable importance with deeper
consideration of their impact than a superficial
overview of their significance might suggest.

The projects which follow are an overview of

those catalysts, projects of experimentation
and an equal measure of architectural
wanderlust, with added focus on those salient
features which would become formative root
ideas in later work. Ranging from renovations
and full houses to temporary structures, each
work is not documented in full, but instead
examines a critical aspect or complex issue
each project attempts to address in relation
to structure or enclosure, concept or finish,
strict typology and experiment. The section
documents, among others, a renovation
done during transition into sole practice,
one house from a series called the black and
white houses, a construction gone wrong
and renarrated with its salvaged structure, a
pavilion for a garden festival, a boardformed
concrete house, a perforated stair and a clay The show wet kitchen of the brickwall
brick finished house on a diet. house; quietly subversive in the way it
brings into spatial focus an otherwise
hidden activity of all asian homes,
The selection of projects reflects an
the show wet kitchen renarrates the
acknowledgement of the particular ideas activity, smells and sounds of work
which each project has contributed to the in the way of entertainment and
total picture of an architecture in progress. romance.
312 313

Top left: Roof beam sectional detail at

the living room area showing junction
between uppermost glazing frame and
the steel I roof beam.

Top right: The mid section junction

where the concrete flat roof slab was
cast against the side flange of the
horizontal cross beam with flashing and
drain channels detailed to prevent rain
water seepage between the joint.

Bottom row: Horizontal cross beam

sections detailing opposite facing
conditions with regards to the living
room enclosure: the sketch on the
left documents openable french doors
above and the sketch to the right shows
the condition where a fixed glazed
upper panel has been specified, either
side coordinated for the effect of better
cross ventilation.

Opposite: The west face of the living

room features a similar fully glazed
face, interrupted at mid level by a
concrete awning cast into the I-section
horizontal brace of the frame for
greater light and heat control from
the afternoon sun. A linear forest
grove of mixed trees along this west
facing boundary provides ultimate sun
protection.

The strategy of bracing the concrete

awning roof against the steel I- section
face of the tall glazed wall was the
structural solution for lateral support
for the concrete slab without resorting
to deep and unwieldly alternatives: the
steel columns and cross beam were
worked out to be capable of taking
both roof gravity loads and the added
lateral load of the concrete awning
comfortably. The concept was taken
to full limit with its application in the
BritishIndia corporate warehouse with
considerably heavier loads involved in
its forty foot (12m) tall and fifty foot
(16m) wide fully glazed entrance.
336
Below left: First sketches of what was
to become the folded stair. Conceived
as a single folded run, like a stair
runner taking on the shape of each
tread and riser, the folded stair was
the immediate product of one initial
concern; its method of finish between
its sides and the uneven walls of
the stairwell. Constructed of a clay
brickwork infill within a concrete
frame, the side walls were separated
by a maximum variance of an inch and
a half along the entire length of the
stair. If the stair were justified to the
maximum bulge on any one particular
side, it would hang out an inch and a
half at some point further along that
same wall, never mind what it did on
the opposing side.
The resultant solution was to have an
aesthetic effect which would make its
initial problem somewhat secondary. In
order to avoid finishing problems were
the stair flight to fit accurately, it was
decided to make the actual width of
the stair narrower than its side walls
by a good margin and finishing the
stair edges with a gap as opposed
to a finish filler. Each riser was then
conceived of as a support beam for
its associated treads above and below
it and steel pins inserted into the
sidewalls supported each riser beam at
their junctions with every upper tread.
To bring light down into the lower
stair run, the stair was constructed of
perforated steel sheets, sized to feel
convincingly solid with someone
337
descending at a full run. The natural
daylight from a skylight above resulted
in transparency streaming through
the stair and from its usually attached
sides, lending an air of immateriality
to the construction. Tolerances and
dimensioned were considered in the
sketch to get a feeling for workability.
Below right: An underside view of the
concept condensed into a single detail,
the junction between tread, riser and
supporting pin.

Opposite page: The folded stair in use;

viewed from certain angles underneath
the stair either going up or coming
down, the stair gives the illusion of
being unsupported from either side.
The perforated sheet was sized up in
thickness to avoid potential flexing and
elastic deformation of the stair treads
over heavy use.

The folded stair was to have tremendous

influence in the rethinking of the
typical handrail for the firestairs in
the gardenwall offices, less in the way
of structural integrity than in the way
the detail expected of a secure joint
can most often be reduced to a single
point of contact thereby expressing the
finish between surface and element as
a separation.
 344 345

Bottom left: Location sketch for
the School of Architecture at the
University of Oregon, describing the
various points on campus related
departments of the school could be
found. The idea was to amalgamate
Bottom centre: The existing main
school with its dual entrances, a
nondescript one off a ceremonial
quadrangle and a formal one from a
nondescript street junction.

appendices appendix i: academia all the components physically into a Bottom right: The existing building: a
recognisable unity. clumsy accretion through the years.
university of oregon, u.s. 1983-88

Understanding architectural work broadens
with some history preceeding the work;
it requires context. This part of the book
documents a portion of that background.
It begins with a selection of academic work
first completed in the United States when
I studied at the University of Oregon under
the tutelage of Professors Jenny Young,
Terrance Goode, Earl Moursund, Ron Lovinger,
Virginia Cartwright, Donald Peting and the
late Mike Shellenbarger, and later at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology with
the Aga Khan program and Professor Ronald
B. Lewcock, Eric Dluhosch, Nader Ardalan
and Masood Khan. The work in Appendices i
and ii describes the beginnings of inquiry and
first designs.
It is difficult sometimes to say when school
ended and professional work began. Much
of that could be attributed to the first ten
years of professional practice I spent at GDP
Architects in Malaysia. Incepted in 1990 by
Kamil Merican, it was a month shy of being two
years old when I joined its ranks. Youth was
entirely on our side and it felt that anything
was fair game. A formative slice of these first
ten years is recorded in Appendix iii, describing
the more important work I felt I was doing
during the time. Mostly, it documents a period
of my life which was spent in the company of
an architect I still consider to be the country's
finest; Kamil’s ability to see possiblities in
architecture and people will always inspire.
Appendix iv is a complete list of work
undertaken personally during the ten years
spent at Group Design Partnership (later to
become GDP Architects): it represents my
bibliography of built and unbuilt projects with
Kamil Merican.
smallprojects was begun in 2002 as a decision
to reclaim old dreams: work since then can be
found listed in Appendix v. Not all the work
during this period has been listed: the unbuilt
designs and several built houses which did
not further my process have been left out.
A small note on the sequence of the built
work under smallprojects: the listed work
has been ordered chronologically, not with
respect to the point in time construction was
begun or completed but in relation to when
the concepts for each were first born and
formulated. It is my feeling that this method
of arrangement makes considerably more
sense to understanding the evolution of ideas
than otherwise.
Early elevational studies for the
American Academy in Rome project.
The rear elevation sits above the street
front elevation beneath.
Many universities in the United States have
policies based on a liberal arts education. It is an
education which prioritises the development of
general knowledge and intellectual capacities for
creativity over that primarily focussed on technical,
professional or vocational curriculums.
Specifically, it meant that aside from requisite
major related coursework, there were other
required classes known as free electives that
involved material professionally unrelated to
one's chosen field of study. Those classes could
generally be selected from theology, literature,
langauges, philosophy, history, mathematics and
science. I made most of my selections from
philosophy, literature and history.
Beyond the natural benefits of having a better
rounded education, what the education in the
liberal arts gave me was the ability to form
connections between disparate ideas and
concepts: it gave me substantial reasons for
design decisions. Philosophically, it rooted my
thinking in relatively deeper ground, such that
the strength of ideas became not merely what
one saw, but what one knew about design and its
development. The following projects are all part
of that early conceptual rooting.
The first year of my undergraduate degree
was an unabridged onslaught of pure learning.
Everything was new and was absorbed. First
exposure to context came in the form of an
existing suburban timber sided home to be site
measured and drawn to scale, serving as the base
for the addition and design of a house and studio
for an artist. The accuracy of site reporting was
emphasised and classes under GZ Brown taught
us how to design according to the softer northern
light for the studio and warmth of south light
for the resting areas for the house. The next
semester of that very same year had us engage
the design of a downtown health club: it introduced
concerns regarding projects of greater complexity
of use and program aside from beginning our
awareness concerning urban issues.
The next two semesters of the second year
presented a suburban fire station and a residential
development of about thirty units in a hilly and
wooded site out of town. These projects dealt
with vehicular traffic as it may affect form and
placement, and the problems faced by sloping
sites and rural development. The projects which
followed over the next years were respectively;
a downtown cinema, a small town library, a
proposal for the new American academy in Rome
and an addition to the School of Architecture and
Allied Arts in Eugene, Oregon. The final year
project was another addition, that for the campus
main library at the University of Oregon itself.
 348
The graduating project was a watershed in a
sense. Its program concerned the expansion of
the current main library on the University of
Oregon campus and involved issues of circulation
complexity, book storage and access, the process
of retrieval and act of reading and finally, the
task of adding an entirely new structure to a
campus buiiding built in 1937. The existing Knight
Library sat at the head of a tree lined north
facing quadrangle, flanked on either side by brick
clad structures, some historically significant such
as the art museum and others less so, but still with
some measure of dignity.
Behind the original structure from 1937 sat a
later addition much in the tradition of the former
but less elegant and clearly more utilitarian in
demeanour. To the back of this block was the site
proper, a piece of land sufficiently large to take
the additional hundred thousand square feet or
so, and bounded by the tall old growth firs of a
cemetery to the east and low lying neighbourhoods
to the south and west.
The library extension was designed to heighten
the experience of the tall cemetery grove behind
it as a backdrop, new library towers of the closed
stacks lining the east edge and allowing views
through in between. The link between the old and
new was designed as a volume for orientation and
circulation to the upper levels: an urban courtyard
roofed with glass lanterns. It demonstrated the
first time I was able to work narrative with some
basic understanding of context into a small vision
of how a contemporary architecture could be. The
results were crude and clearly more picturesque
than explorative from the viewpoint of material
use and manner of construction, but thereafter, all
the projects I undertook, academic or professional
would be guided by some degree of knit
349
between context and narrative.But regardless
of immediate impressions, each of the various
projects had intrinsic value for me: they taught
deep concern for the primacy of building program;
the different aspects of space as related to use
and function of any particular building type.
It grounded the sense of varying spatial needs
catering to differences in building typology:
human circulation being of critical consideration
in transport hubs, the activity of reading and
book storage forming the basic narrative for
libraries, the social condition of gathering,
interaction and creative exchange that is a school
of architecture.
In retrospect, those undergraduate years
encouraged the kind of critical thinking that I was
to rely tremendously on in my later years, raising
issues I have only begun to understand more
recently: they grounded my need for relevance.

Left and top right: The quad bench;
sited against the trunk of the third
towering elm in Killian court, sits on
the edge of the quadrangle looking
out, with the view of the bench
upright from the side aisle of the
elms texturally finding empathy with
the fluted columns of Building 10.
Viewed from the pathways crossing
the quadrangle, the bench sits as a
fallen cross bright against the dark
rhododendron background, configured
for a single person facing the side aisle
or a twosome, backs against the bench
upright and elm trunk respectively and
facing each other.
Bottom right: The construction of
the bench required interlocking sets
of pine threaded through eight sets
of threaded rods for each layer to
establish structural rigidity and the
desired striated texture. The assembly
was then hauled Golgotha-like to the
site, a journey of painstaking care for
the lawn it was to sit on.
Opposite page:
Top row: Sketches showing the
inceptual idea of the fallen leaf
pile and how shaping the pile into
the archiebunker chair was to be
accomplished.
Bottom left: View of the chair from its
side wing. Named by Andrew Russin
in acknowledgement of its backwoods
honesty and uncompromise, it went
on to win the Harvard lawn furniture
competition.
355
Middle right: Contrasting galvanised
wire and maple leaves in a closeup of
the upholstered chair; packed with half
a room of autumn maple leaves, the
chair had sufficient body and give for a
comfortable seat.
Bottom right: After time and regular
use, the upholstered fill gradually
disintegrates and sheds, returning it to
where it was first gathered, awaiting
renewal with its next fill from the
coming season.

While all this work was proceeding with the
Aga Khan program, I kept myself in touch with
the building technology section, headed by
Professor Eric Dluhosch, to a fuller understanding
of material integrity in construction. I was
also involved in a class on 'making', taught by
Ed Levine. It was simply another important
lesson in perceiving the nuances of the
environment and creating contextually. The
quad bench was built as part of the class.
Halfway through the degree program, a close
friend, Andrew Russin, and I saw a large flyer
out late one night calling for entries for Harvard
University's first lawn furniture competition. It was
an open competition and, being sponsored by the
other university on the opposite end of Cambridge,
sparked something in us despite it being
already dark, deep fall, cold outside and entries
due the very next day. It being autumn, I had the
image of Linus van Pelt running up and leaping
into a huge pile of dead leaves came to mind in
the form of a huge bean bag. Fallen leaves were
plentiful outside and it took minutes to gather
bundles. Chicken wire was purchased at a 24 hour
store for leaf containment but it quickly became
apparent that chicken wire left too many things
unresolved as a bean bag shell, from the sharp
points of the joint line to bent bits of wire when
the bag was used. The archiebunker chair was
born when I found a busted low slung armchair;
we wound our roll of chicken wire around the
stripped frame to approximate the general shape
of the armchair we had in mind and upholstered
it with the bale of maple leaves we scraped from
the street earlier. In order to get the form of the
chair just right, about three times the amount of
leaves than we expected had to be stuffed and
we used traditional methods of tying the wire
upholstery down to shape, plumping the arms
and seat with better form.The chair made it to
the venue on time early the next morning and it
won first prize. The citation went along the lines
of the entry’s theoretical strength, being about
its decomposition and return to the soil and the
fact that with use, the autumn leaves gradually
disintegrate allowing for renewal possibilities
the next season. It was also deemed to be the
most comfortable of all the entries which was
really the only thing we had in mind during its
upholstery. But amid the celebrations of our little
conquest, I had learned an important lesson in
specific context in putting the the timeless craft
of upholstery to dead leaves for a competition
in autumn.
 382 383

Minco corporate office renovation,

Minco corporate office renovation,
Petaling Jaya 1999.
Top: The additional concrete floor
cast into the carcass of the existing
warehouse was designed to leave
a double storey circulation spine
between its edge and the existing
warehouse side wall. The spine
begins at the side of the office
library and runs the full length of
the warehouse to intermittent stairs
to connect with department offices
located on the side. The existing
warehouse walls along the spine had
a series of windows eccentrically
cut into its bulk for the benefits of
morning sunlight.
Petaling Jaya 1999.
Top and bottom left: Inceptual
sketches for the oval stair linking
Bottom: Side elevation of the the administrative block to the
corporate warehouse wing along resource library. The intention was
the entrance driveway. The existing to have a steel stair hung off the
huge double sliding doors of the structural curve of a concrete wall
warehouse were maintained and which also doubles as an entrance
painted in the gold of the company’s wall for the library.
corporate colours, with steel grille
gates put in for the purposes of Bottom centre: Construction detail
security, good daylighting and showing steel stair joint with
ventilation. A louvred main elevation reinforced concrete wall support.
was designed for the new corporate
face of the existing three storey Top right: Resource library looking
block and protection from the glare south east with steel oval stair in
of the direct morning sun. the background.
Bottom left: Site entrance layout
plan with driveway in cast concrete
and embedded construction
aggregate.

The warehouse renovation project for Minco went
on the ground in 1999. Sited in the belly of an old
warehouse with an adjacent warehouse block, the
Minconsult Corporate office was designed for a
multidisciplinary engineering firm; a rare breed
of client who understood the balance of corporate
image and the honed ‘unpolished’ product. But
not without its own price: Minco was run by
Rose and Dennis Ganendra at the time, clever
insistent clients who were as sharp about value
for money as they were about consultant trickery.
Their brief was to renovate twin run down clear
spanned factory warehouses, each of about forty
thousand existing square feet to accommodate an
additional fifty five thousand square feet, with the
inclusion of all mechanical and electrical systems,
for five million ringgit (just over 1.5 million
US dollars). Although costs were considerably
lower in 1999, 55 ringgit a square foot at the
time was nonetheless a small sum to work
with. Subtracting the necessary costs for
plumbing, electrical and the ancillary mechanical
systems and what was left over would have barely
paid for a reinforced concrete frame and slab.
As such, the renovation infill was raw in concrete
and bare of finish, with the precious little spent on
cement hardener for the floors, paint to disguise
the ugly and the remainder on a minimalist
Memorial Library for the clients' late father.
The one extravagance was a steel stair for the
library, painted royal blue and hung off only one
side from a curved gold coloured concrete wall in
acknowledgement of corporate colours. Although
my ability coordinating electrical services at the
time was appalling, the renovation was simple
and relatively straightforward architecturally and
the project taught the value of economy and the
power of paint. Its lessons would in later years,
prove invaluable.
The scheme was simple: of the twin warehouses
one became corporate and the other a store.
Marked by the sentinel of a water tower, site
entry was made from the back between the twin
warehouses. The corporate warehouse had the
ground floor of its existing three storey rear block
cleared for a lobby and a new roof was designed
for the 3 storey volume of an office memorial
library linking the taller existing office to its
warehouse, which itself had a single immense
concrete slab put in for an additional floor. The
Minconsult corporate office was designed to
be an environment of planes, voids, solids and
transparencies. It was an attempt to revise the
powerful associations of imported granite and
marble to corporate identity with an assembly
of painted surfaces, bare concrete, loose gravel,
steel and glass which we hoped would speak
more for the grace of corporate blue-collar
architecture.