Boomerang

When I tell my friends and colleagues that I am not completely at ease with large buildings, and prefer to do smaller buildings that I (with the help of a junior) can design, document and supervise to completion, they don't take me seriously. This is why I often find myself in the midst of a large project looking for smaller components to design and detail, such as this club house for an apartment block. Ideal for an early Saturday morning when even the dogs are asleep.

The building's form is pushed and pulled into an irregular shape by setback requirements, the positioning of the swimming pool and an adjacent driveway - it ended up looking like a boomerang.

rough sketch up model by me

As a counterfoil to the building form, a low concrete canopy sweeps across the front of the club house for the drop off and car parks. The folded walls the first floor allude to the elevation treatment of the apartment building, the gaps in between them allow filtered sunlight into the rooms.

A nicer model by my juniors, with the apartment in the background

This is an opportunity to indulge myself in a bit of time to design and day-dream, and derive another spark of delight from this project.

Next up - a cardboard model.

MCO and working from home.

Belian swing for small children, there is a hole at the bottom; easier for washing when the kids get over-excited and pee themselves

When we first heard about this restriction, we thought that it would last the two weeks imposed and then we would get back to our 'normal' lives. It is just a precautionary measure by the government, I thought to myself as I packed work sketches, drawings and letters to refine and finish at home. This quarantine would be a great opportunity to sort out the garden and tidy up the house. I would have time on my hands, as I cleaned up the belian swing to use as a work station in the garden room.

tomato seedlings in paper pots

We built a screen to keep the cats in, so now they have a room.

Uppermost on my mind to make sure that everyone had work to do, something to occupy themselves while they quarantined themselves at home with their family members. Instead when we met on-line at our first Monday Morning Meeting, my first thoughts was instead to re-assure them that they will still be getting full pay (without overtime), and we would meet regularly to discuss sticking points and gauge progress. Everyone seemed quite positive and even excited, this was no doubt aided by PH's presence - as a younger partner in the business he was more like an elder brother (or young uncle), a mentor to our young team. And since he is based in KL, he has always communicated with the team via phone and email - the ZOOM conference was just a short stretch of the imagination and work habit.

When the two weeks was extended by another 2 weeks and then another fortnight, there were other duties which we did not foresee but took in our stride. We found our that the security guard in my former company had difficulty in getting to and from work - the public bus service had stopped. He was forced to stay put, and live in the office.
DL rang and told me this; half complaining and half gossiping - so we thought that we will help in providing meals for Janting.  We also found out that the kitchen once fully equipped now only had a rice cooker, and the TV lounge did not have a telly anymore (I wonder who took it?).

Mao

Movement by car was limited to one person, so either I drove or Sam did taking turns with DL (who lived down the road from the office) to provide him with home cooked meals, an occasional beer and some fruits. We drove to the office and fed the cats on alternate days making sure the bowl was filled to the brim and they had plenty of water. Eventually the two office cats come home and stayed in Sean's room for a while.

tent resort

We worked through the MCO, each enduring our own struggles no doubt; barking dogs, crying babies, no air-cond, family members getting in the way and melding of work and home lives. Despite this FL and PH worked solidly and turned out a good housing scheme which was accepted by the client. So, in the midst of worry about cash flow, we had several silver linings; this scheme ensured work in the next two years, two clients paid fees during the MCO while another texted to remind to claim fees for work done last month. Our contractors who were allowed to work became more organised and submitted detailed progress reports to replace out fortnightly progress meetings.

The garden room

On the home front, Sam continued with her exercise classes; on-line - it is not the same for her without the camaraderie of her gym-buddies but she persisted. I joined her as it was illegal to run outside. Sean was struggling to finish his thesis, and without the participation of his studio mates and tutors, I could see that it was a struggle. He was on his own in a room, going out only to replenish supplies. Many shops were closed. Sara after a short spell on her own, was adopted by a uni-mate's family and lived with them in return for helping out with cooking and house chores.

#UCSI on-line crit

I learnt that people are resilient, we adapt as a matter of survival, we find ways to continue with the tasks at hand. We do this to support ourselves and others financially, and emotionally. I learnt to not always talk to them about work, but about them. We bought lunches on-line for the team and had them delivered one Sunday, as a surprise for the approval of a building plan submission.

We learnt that we had many things in our possession which we do not need, or (in my case) is under-utilised. I realised this when I cleaned up and moved out in to the garden pavilion; my new office. The long space was filled with morning light and ideal for a studio - the long dining table has been cleared of crockery and cutlery and is now filled with drawings, sketch-books and reading material. More about this in later posts.

home office

#MCO #workingfromhome

Maggie Centre at Nine Wells, Dundee

A House for the end of life
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b00wr7rp

Maggie's Centres was founded by and named after the late Maggie Keswick Jencks, who died of cancer in 1995. Like her husband, architectural writer and critic Charles Jencks, she believed in the ability of buildings to uplift people. The buildings that house the centres have been designed by leading architects, including Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid and Richard Rogers.^[1]They are not intended as a replacement for conventional cancer therapy, but as a caring environment that can provide support, information and practical advice. They are located near, but are detached from, existing NHS hospitals.

In May 2019, we were near one and dropped in for a visit.

A lady at the centre very kindly asked if we needed any help. We explained that we were just visiting - 'you must be an architect, I know because you have a posh sketch book'. She smiled at her own joke and left us. There was a meeting at the kitchen, half a dozen people gathered around a dining table with steaming cups of something; tea perhaps and biscuits.
We went upstairs and sat in the Quiet room, in the belly of the tower with a solitary window and a skylight. It was very peaceful.

The Quiet room

Sculpture by Andrew Gromley

This was Frank Gehry's first building in UK, and won the 'Building of the Year' in 2003.

Belakang Kong Heng

An old diary and a ball point pen

Someone remarked that this looks like a colouring book, she was referring to the Paint company logo on the page. I told her that this was a habit left over from the tutoring days, when I reminded students that it is not necessary to invest in expensive drawing equipment and material to develop a skill. Sometimes, all it takes is an old diary and hotel room pens.

 It takes me about 10 minutes to frame the sketch and capture all the forms, and another 5 minutes to add details and shade.

 This is a re-visit, this time to capture the space more simply with lines only and no colour - to reflect the peace and quiet of the space. Later we visited the Catholic museum next door, and saw paintings by a well-known priest. No one could tell us anymore about the 2 sisters buried in the front garden.

Since I had sketched the churches and the temples, I finished the sketch crawl with this mosque just in time for lunch at Macallum.

Kitten in a pot

I buried the dead kitten in a flower pot this morning.

Sam told me several days before that there was a kitten loose in our garden, the silly thing probably escaped from a neighbour's yard to play in our garden. It played its last on Tuesday morning when I saw it next to the Moringa tree. I first mistook the strange twist of its body for one of Ellie's blankets left out on the lawn, covered with grass clippings. It was still soft but the torso had begun to stiffen. I wrapped the poor thing in one of Ellie's blankets, and stood there wondering what to do. Normally, I would have dug a hole and buried it but I didn't want to upset Sam who was beginning to wake up upstairs.

Then I had the idea to bury her in a pot rather than digging and risk waking Sam up. I wasn't sure of the dead kitten's sex, but it had pretty stripes and a tiny face - so it's a she. I decided on the lychee plant because the fruit is sweet and the leaves very pretty. I placed her at the bottom of the pot and put the pot in the exact spot where I had found her. I planted the lychee over her, and then I watered the plant and went back inside. Still in the darkness.

The Tropical Malaysian House II

8 houses in Sarawak will be featured in Robert Powell's next edition of The Tropical Malaysian House, the 'Prof' and photographer Lin Ho have been travelling around Kuching in the past few months visiting the houses, interviewing the owners and architects.

The selected houses are a good cross section of styles and sizes in different locations. Megan and Chuan's renovated timber house is in the centre of Kuching, while CheeWee's bungalow in the Padawan Highlands, Mike Boon's tiny house for his friend is in sharp contrast to Sam Lau's cluster of family villas designed with Andra Matin. William Khoo's Borneo Mansion in fair-faced concrete recently won a Silver Medal at the PAM Awards - one in a series of courtyard houses which will be featured in the book. Mingi's nestled house is 2 blocks linked around a courtyard, while Arlene Chew's Keranji House is a series of pavilions laid out in a mature garden with trees. Richard and Dona's house for their 4 sons was selected after I sent Robert photos and sketches of the house.

I also sent him photos of The Ramp House, which he agreed to publish. I underestimated the amount of pleasure and pride the owner derive from this inclusion - a reminder to constantly record our work. 

The book is scheduled to be launched during DATUMKL next year.