30 May 2022 Monday - Designing new buildings

I forgot how much I enjoy drawing, especially as a means of solving planning or design problems. A printed set of floor plans to be refined; to reduce floor areas while maintaining quality spaces, allow a natural ventilated lift lobby, (and later I found out that there is a third type of floor plate in the overall equation. 

Sam and Sara arrived late in the evening, after I had drawn up the plans and gone for a run to complete the day. It was a good run, I felt lighter and the Torin helped.

29 May 2022 Sunday - Alone again unnaturally

 

28 May 2022 Saturday - low maintenance friendships

 

Sam and I talked about maintaining friendships, and thought of several friends with whom we have a strong continuous relationship although we rarely catch up or speak to each other. Yet we know that at a pinch, we would drop everything and fly to their aid, no questions asked. And they'd do the same for us.

Two of them live in KL, so I reached out to both but one was in Australia. We surprised the other by getting the kids to invite her for dinner near our hotel; Selinna is their god-mother. And true enough, we easily caught up and promised to try going to Scotland together for Sean's graduation.

Today, we met Laila, Kamal and their daughters - she and I went to uni together and have not met for 35 years until recently when she found me on FB. We have a soft spot for each other, and over lunch I realised that we were a bit like siblings in how we are interested in the more mundane aspects of our lives. Even in uni, when she talked to me about her thoughts about her relationship with then boyfriend now husband. Now she talks about sending her youngest, her son who is in Year 1 of architecture school - and we agreed that perhaps he can train under Sean. 

Yesterday, I was very pleased to see the hugs Sam gave to SL at lunch - like how a mother would embrace a daughter. Today, I received hugs usually reserved for fathers from another of our borrowed children - Jenny who coincidentally was staying in the hotel room next to ours. Just yesterday I mentioned to Sam that this is the locality where Jenny regularly roams and takes photographs and records conversations with street side peddlers of food snacks. (which she is usually seen with, in small plastic bags: one snack item per bag).

I worry about her.

We chatted about the possibility of her re-entering her field of study, and offered to help as a catalyst in the form of a small project that we could work together on. 

27 May 2022 Friday - meeting Richard Kirk

The main reason for this trip was to meet Richard Kirk, and to attend his presentation of 2 projects that we might be working on. We ended up taking about the smaller project, which is a confirmed job for us - so it seems that we would be project collaborators; quite a privilege especially seeing that it was handed to us.

He invited us for dinner - Sam joined PH and I at the Troika Sky Restaurant to meet RK. It is important in every relationship to sit across the table and talk face to face. And later, if the vibe is right - sit across the table this time with food in between to share, which was what we do.

I felt that RK was very generous with his information about technical issues, design intent and how he deals with clients without showing off (as I am prone to do). We felt that he did so with the intention to share knowledge and teach, which is good because there's much to learn. Some of it will be hard to incorporate into our system, but I think it's good for us. 

26 May 2022 Thursday - Tian Jing Hotel

Sam bought a book about KL's Chinatown and found some interesting places to visit. I think she picked this hotel because of the name 'TianJing' which is from the Chinese word meaning sky-well (often carelessly translated as air-well). The Chinese word 'sky' represents more than air; tian-qi (weather), tian-kong (air, heaven) and so forth. 

New in the Old: Chinatown Kuala Lumpur
by 

Scarlet Koon,

 

Aw Siew Bee,

 

Robert Powell

The hotel is built across two typical shop lots - it appears that the rooms are planned parallel to the street which meant that they would have no views or windows. This problem is solved by introducing a long sky-well along one party wall (with its neighbour), this allows light and air into the hotel rooms on both floors. Along the other party wall, a similar treatment is given to the hotel corridors and stairs, and likely gave the hotel its name. 

The street views are given to more communal spaces such as Lim Kee Cafe on the ground floor, and the Nanyang Lounge on the upper floor (where guests can have breakfast). Very sensible.

A plan of our room - it reminded me of the rooms in my grandmother's house

two long 'tian jing(s)' are introduced; one for the rooms and the other for the corridor and service spaces.

the basin stand and toilet outside alludes to a time when this was the norm in the upstairs rooms

basin stand and spitoon

the smell of mosquito coils burning embellished my memory of nights at grandmother's house.

The upstairs and downstairs hotel guests share a tree in the courtyard

The upstairs corridor is 'cut' back to allow light and rain to filter to the ground floor. The chippings in mesh is a floor drain.

Any singing in the shower is done quietly.

 

25 May 2022 Wednesday 2022 LACE

 

24 May 2022 Tuesday 2022 scope of work

Sean and I worked on these screens at Bagan Specialist Centre, the recently CEO requested for us to design something to prevent wind driven rain drops from misting into the waiting area outside the Operating Theatres. 

 

23 May 2022 Monday - what do architects do all day?

6.45 a.m. game of tennis with Kelvin and Ni at the club before Tay collects me for our studio at UNIMAS

An idea which I saw at the back page of the AJ (Architect's Journal, RIBA) many years ago, in which architects describe their day in a series of photographs (Polaroids) - some depict structured time management in neatly cropped snapshots while others show a chaotic day rushing from airport to local council to site and back again in blurry images taken on the run. 

We thought we would invite our readers to do the same - describe their day in a series of images and short captions - I'll start. And I nominate Chai Si Yong to be the next contributor.

9.30 a.m. Crit at UNIMAS with Ar. Nurina and Ar. Abg Razali; who were invited to review our students' work.

11.30 a.m. once a week we take turns to cook lunch at the office

.

1.30 p.m. Hotel refurbishment project - site visit with sub contractors to finalise M&E routing

2.30 p.m. TV room extension - inspecting recently struck concrete wall.

3.30 p.m. - afternoon tea with the MD

5.00 p.m. COVE 55; a trip to the seaside with mom, to check defects rectification.

6.30 p.m. last minute tidying up before dinner, Dory stands guard.

6.30 p.m. last minute tidying up before dinner

9.00 p.m. doodling after dinner, listening to Stephen Fry on Qi

22 May 2022 Sunday

 

21 May 2022 Saturday 2022

 

20 May 2022 Friday -

 

19 May 2022 Thursday - Enclave

Our first meeting with RK on Enclave - we sent some comments on the design development set yesterday for today's meeting, they were useful for starting the conversation and also for us to see if our ideas will be well-received. RK was as usual warm and receptive - the client noted that we were all playing nicely with each other. I think it is because we are both mature enough not to have anything to prove other than that we are collaborate to produce a good architectural product. 

 

18 May 2022 Wednesday - Morpholio Trace

 

17 May 2022 Tuesday

 

16 May 2022 Monday - Goodbye Toffee

Toffee a.k.a. Mr. Brown passed away last Saturday, at Rosalind's house where he had been permanently staying since we left DNA in 2015. He was 14 years old, and much loved. Rosalind referred to him as 'her perfect gentleman'.

This is an excerpt from a blog post from 2011.

Toffee the dog is two timing us - Sam and I rescued him from a short life on the streets (at the end Lorong Stampin 19) and gave him a home at DNA. One day, he escaped. We thought that we had lost him for good, because we looked everywhere. Then Rosalind from down the street rang up and said "I think I have your dog; I am now his mummy, he has been with us for several weeks and we call him Mr. Brown".
So, we agreed to have a time-share dog who would benefit from twice the loving.

Toffee rolls in mid morning like a CEO; checks in with Leong and I before having a nap. He stays for lunch with Arlene. In the afternoon, he wanders around taking part in our group discussions. At 4 pm, Bobby, the black and white dog comes to the office gate and barks for Toffee. Mola opens the door for Toffee, and Mr. Brown joins Bobby to return home to mommy and dinner.

Sometimes, Life should be simple like that.

Mr. Brown (eyes)

the perfect gentleman

Bobby comes calling at 4pm each work day (but never once entered the office)

and they are off, like two teenagers after school.