Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Tourist Attraction???

Spotted this tour bus along Chay Yan Street at about 2:15pm today.

What caught my attention was there were so many people milling around block 76 Guan Chuan Street.

Initially I thought they were tourist but on a closer look, they don’t look like the part.

I wonder why this group of people are here today.

Could they be local tour guides who are on a familiarisation tour so that they can offer Tiong Bahru Estate as an alternative local tourist attraction?

Time will tell.

Saturday, April 12, 2008

Almost Unchanged

Check this out!

If you are around the Tiong Bahru Estate, walk over to Block 37 Lim Liak Street to look at stack 45 & 47. These two stacks (or columns) have remained almost unchanged all these years.

It seems that no one has moved out before. (Just look at the ORIGINAL WINDOWS!) Even if the units did changed hands, the current occupants did not do much renovation to the units.

MediaCorp, if you need an authentic 1950’s backdrop, this place would be the one!

Better hurry before someone decided to renovate and you would have lost the opportunity FOREVER.

Here are some more past and present photos to ignite some nostalgia:

Block 37 Lim Liak Street in the 2008

Block 37 Lim Liak Street in the 1950s
Collection of Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts,
Courtesy of National Archives of Singapore

Friday, April 11, 2008

Can you spot the difference?

Location: Block 43 & 36 Moh Guan Terrace
2008 Moh Guan Terrace


1950s Moh Guan Terrace
Collection of Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts,
Courtesy of National Archives of Singapore


For the 1950's picture, the building on the left has open balconies whiles the 2008 ones are covered up with concrete.

It is the same for the buildings on the right. HDB put in the windows in 1973 when they sold the units to the tenants.

The substation is still there but a fence surrounds it now.

I bet you could spot more differences and I shan't rob you of the fun.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Window Restoration in Progress

I was having a chat with this guy from China yesterday.

Even though I was having trouble understanding his heavily accent Mandarin, I understood he was complaining about why this owner would not just replace the windows.

He kept saying the windows are old and it is dangerous to keep them as they risk falling off. He kept mumbling that it would be better to just change all of them.

Maybe he was trying to frighten the owners into changing the windows so that he need not spend so much time "processing" the windows.

From what he described to me, it does indeed sounded very time consuming. But then again, restoration work is never a breeze right?




Chipping away all the old putty that held the window panes to the frame

At the same time, he cannot damage the green window panes as I think these are irreplaceable. His boss has been scouting around for the glass but he just cannot find them.

After he takes out all the glass, he has to sandpaper the entire frame before rust-proofing it. Some of the window hinges are already quite badly damaged. This guy has to weld the hinges back.

I'm glad this home owner took the pain to restore the windows and not take the easy way out by replacing them.
____________________________________________________

Here're some tips on restoring and preserving old windows:

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Could this happen to Tiong Bahru?

Straits Times
April 8, 2008
An ambitious plan to convert one of the few remaining colonial buildings in skyscraper-dominated Hong Kong has rekindled a fierce debate about how the former colony deals with its heritage. -- PHOTO: AFP
Spiky design sparks debate over Hong Kong's heritage

HONG KONG - AN AMBITIOUS plan to convert one of the few remaining colonial buildings in skyscraper-dominated Hong Kong has rekindled a fierce debate about how the former colony deals with its heritage.

In the past year, fierce protests over the removal of the city's Star Ferry terminal and the destruction of Queen's Pier, where Britain's royalty used to step onto the territory, has altered the city's laissez-faire attitude to development, activists say.

Now, a HK$1.8 billion (S$318 million) plan to convert the old police station, jail and magistrates court into a gleaming commercial, arts and public space has become a testing ground for the city's ability to reconcile historical and profit concerns.

The scheme, with a distinctive set of giant spikes in a prime residential and commercial area, has divided opinion.

'The proposal of building a 50-storey glass tower inside the complex is unbelievable. And to me, it definitely will dominate the whole heritage site and actually won't do any good to it,' said Ms Katty Law, an activist.

Mr William Yiu, executive director of charities at the Hong Kong Jockey Club, whose gambling monolopoly has allowed it to become both the city's biggest taxpayer and philanthropic giver, said their scheme is an attempt to do something new.

'We want this to set an example of conservation,' said Mr Yiu, who is running the scheme that sits on one of the few remains of the British colonial era to survive in the city's Central district dominated by gleaming office blocks.

'The idea is that we can do a new building at an historical site with facilities that we very much need in Hong Kong.'

The site was chosen by the British navy as the centre for law and order when it took over the island, then little more than an obscure rock, in 1841, and it flourished as the city expanded.

New design The new design - by Swiss architects Herzog and de Meuron, who are behind the Birds Nest Olympic stadium in Beijing and the conversion of the Tate Modern in London - will put galleries, boutiques and restaurants within the shells of the existing listed buildings.

It will then create a new structure behind the buildings that will include a theatre, a cinema and two elevated public gardens, bordered by the collection of spikes which will have plants growing around them.

The spikes, inspired by the distinctive pattern of the bamboo scaffolding seen across the city, have drawn ire from residents nearby and also concern that it will upset the city's feng shui, or energy system, which is rumoured to have been a factor in several other major building designs in Hong Kong.

Mr Yiu said he is not expecting a repeat of the protests at Queen's Pier last summer, when conservationists tied themselves to the structure to try and stop its removal, as the buildings will be left in place.

He said the Jockey Club has been involved in a lengthy public consultation, despite being given pre-approval by Chief Executive Donald Tsang in his annual policy speech last year and that parts of the design, including the spikes, were being reconsidered as a result.

Public pressure Campaigners say that public pressure in recent years has transformed the government's attitude to conservation, where commercial considerations have steamrollered any concerns in the past.

'I think the government is now realising that there are opportunities and that it is nice to have some diversity,' said Mr Paul Zimmerman, founding member of pressure group Designing Hong Kong.

'(They see) it is wrong to have just a monotony of podium-style buildings with no street level interface and just big towers on top. I think that they're recognising that that is not necessarily good for building a community.'

Mr John Batten, whose campaigns have enjoyed success in stopping several developments - including on the site of the former residential quarters for married police officers where Mr Tsang grew up - said the change in attitude among authorities has been marked.

'Government has changed dramatically. They are now pointing the finger at the property developers. Before they would not have looked for the faults,' he said.

Mr Batten said the change has come about because of a series of strong targeted campaigns, ranging from the Queen's Pier demonstration to efforts to stop the destruction of traditional wet markets.

'I think these cases come down to a very grassroots approach. It is built on community support for the ideas,' he said.

However Mr Batten is frustrated at the way the new Jockey Club scheme was presented as a fait accompli before consultation.

'The way they have approached it is muddly and murky. They came up with a bright and breezy plan and they thought everyone would think it was great, but it is not very practical,' he said. -- AFP


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Saturday, April 5, 2008

Ignorance is bliss????

Tonight's posting was inspired by Belle who made a comment under the posting "A piece of HISTORY".

Belle's comment made me reflect about the countless of "extinct" stuff I had the opportunity to see during the course of my work within the Tiong Bahru Estate.

For example, I saw this interesting stove about 2 years ago.

I kinda knew the stove might be of some value to some but I just do not know where I might be able to find such a person.




The owner of the stove was so pre-occupied with packing up his stuff for the moving out, he did not have time to think about who might want this piece of "junk". So he did the easiest thing, pay someone to discard them.

Looking at Belle's comments tonight, this stove came back to haunt me and reminded me of my indifference towards rare things from the past.


I did some online searching for a similar looking stove and found that one exists in some UK museum. You may want to check it out here:
Science Museum.


The article on the similar stove could be found here: New World Gas Cooker


I now know that these types of stoves were designed in the 1930s and were in use till 1973.

If only I did some online searching earlier.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

A piece of HISTORY

Saw a renovation in progress and amongst the rubbles,

I was pleasantly thrilled to be able to find an almost intact piece of brick from the 1930s.

These bricks were hacked down by the owner of this new flat as she wanted a bigger room and the sealed up chimneys system does not serve any purpose at all.


This protrusion, (Next to the refrigerator) is part of the chimney system used back in the 30s.

The chimney system, hacked away due to obsolescence.
Notice the 2 darkened black stripes. These are the soot covered area within the chimneys.


The outlets are still there but I guess it leads to nowhere now.

This is a picture of a chimney system that still exists in some of the homes within the Tiong Bahru Estate Pre-War flats. It is getting harder and harder to find these things now.

Anyway, these Alexandra bricks were the same bricks that were used to build the Old National Library. That old library was torn down to create a tunnel so that motorist could save a few precious minutes a day. What appears to be SAVINGS is in fact a permanent LOSS for generations to come.

Facing brick from the National Library at Stamford Road

At least 5000 bricks were retained from the old building in 2004 and now form part of a wall in the basement garden of the Library at Victoria Street. The bricks were baked at the Alexandra Brickworks factory, with clay from Jurong.

More articles on the Old National Library could be found at Wikipedia