The Singapore chapter of Docomomo (Documentation and Conservation of Buildings, Sites and Neighbourhoods of Modern Movement) was formally established in early 2021. It is a non-profit group that consists of members from diverse backgrounds. It was set up to:

• research and educate ourselves about the modern built heritage of Singapore.

• advocate for and work with partners to find creative, sustainable, and inclusive ways to conserve and retrofit the modern built heritage of Singapore.

The origins of the Docomomo Singapore can be traced to the formation of a working group in early 2018 after the Pearl Banks Apartments was sold in a collective sale and threatened with demolition. With the recognition that the Pearl Banks Apartments might be the first of many modernist icons built in the 1970s and 1980s that would be sold in collective sales and demolished through a very narrow understanding of redevelopment, the working group was formed to fulfil the urgent need to advocate for environmentally more sustainable and socio-culturally more appropriate alternatives of redevelopment and value creation.

Since 2018, Docomomo Singapore has organised a major international conference in November 2019, published op-eds and articles on different aspects of Singapore's built heritage in newspapers and magazines, researched and created an inventory of modern buildings of Singapore.

 

Part1 - A Brief History of People's Park Complex

People's Park Complex is a site of multiple intersecting histories, evolving from a key social space in colonial-era Chinatown, to a bustling commercial space known as sin chew pasah, to a protagonist of the post-independence state-led urban renewal programme, and finally emerging as a realised vision of avant-garde urban-architectural ideas for post-independence Singapore

People's Park in Colonial Singapore

The inception of People's Park dates to 1881, when Governor of the Straits Settlements Sir Frederick Weld allocated 15 acres of land at the foot of Pearl's Hill for a new park. The area surrounding the park, designated the ‘Chinese Campong' in the 1822 Jackson Plan, housed a rapidly growing population of Southern Chinese settlers. The new ‘People's Park' provided an open reprieve from the back-to-back shophouses and crowded streets across New Bridge Road, serving as one of the few urban public spaces in late-19th century-Singapore.

Over time, People's Park was transformed from a curated recreational landscape into a centre for mercantile activity. Itinerant street hawkers selling fresh produce, sundries, cooked food, and small wares peddled their goods within the park grounds. As commercial activity grew and eventually replaced the landscaped grounds, People's Park became a centre for the economic and social life of Chinatown, giving rise to its vernacular dialect name, sin chew pasah or the ‘People's Market'.

Independence and Urban Renewal

When Singapore attained internal self-government from the British in 1959, Chinatown was chronically overcrowded, with many living in squalid cubicle conditions. Some 140,000 people lived in a 2km2 area, with poor sanitation and the endemic spread of diseases. Alongside mass public housing provision, the newly elected People's Action Party (PAP) made the transformation of the city centre a priority.

In 1962, Norwegian architect-planner Erik Lorange made several recommendations to the government as part of a United Nations (UN) technical assistance programme. These included active state involvement in urban renewal through land acquisition, comprehensive planning, and tailored incentives for private development. Lorange advised that urban renewal should be undertaken through a "two-pronged centrifugal" framework beginning from the northern and southernmost precincts, ‘North 1' (Beach Road) and ‘South 1' (Pearl's Hill). In 1963, Lorange's recommendations were supplemented by a second UN team comprising Otto Koenigsberger, Charles Abrams, and Susumu Kobe. The ‘KAK' team suggested that urban renewal be undertaken through "action programmes" with coordinated resettlement, land acquisition, infrastructural, and redevelopment works.

Equipped with these recommendations, a three-man Urban Renewal Unit led by architect-planner Alan Choe was formed within the Housing and Development Board (HDB) in 1964, which soon evolved into a fully-fedged Urban Renewal Department (URD). In 1966, the Land Acquisition Act was passed, allowing the state to acquire privately owned land "for any public purpose" at effectively below-market prices. That same year, 90% of the land in precinct South 1 (S1) was acquired, involving the displacement of 2,376 families and businesses. Resettlement plans were hastened by a fre which ravaged a large portion of People's Park Market in December 1966.

In 1967, the URD launched the ‘Sale of Sites' programme to facilitate private sector participation in urban renewal. The frst land sale included sites in People's Park, the Golden Mile, Kallang Park, and River Valley, and was focused on residential, shopping, and hotel development. To encourage investment from a nascent development sector, the URD devised a set of incentives, which included property tax exemptions, favourable fnancing provisions, and priority approval of plans. 

The URD prepared ‘simulated plans' for each sales site, which specifed uses, plot ratios, foor plans, and building massing. Developers were allowed to adopt, amend, or propose alternatives to the URD's simulated designs, with architectural innovation weighed alongside economic considerations in awarding tenders. For the People's Park Complex site, the URD proposed a mixed-use fats and shopping complex that resembled the nearby HDB-built Outram Park Complex, with a commercial podium topped by three residential slab blocks. 

In 1967, glass merchant turned developer Ho Kok Cheong won the tender for the site. Ho and his architects, the young frm Design Partnership (DP), aspired to "recapture and recreate the atmosphere [of People's Park] on a larger and more sophisticated scale", noting that the site had "become legendary in the hearts and minds of the citizens of Singapore as a place of gaiety, life, and activity."

Urban-Architectural Vision

Design Partnership was formed in 1967 by partners William Lim, Koh Seow Chuan, and Tay Kheng Soon. All had previously been part of Malayan Architects Co-Partnership (MAC), which produced a diverse and infuential body of work that adapted modernism to the context of independence-era Singapore and Malaya, including the Singapore Conference Hall and Trade Union House (1965), now listed as a National Monument. 

The architects of DP were deeply engaged with late-modern architectural discourse concerned with humanising large-scale modern development, associated with groups such as Team X and Jacqueline Tyrwhitt, both of whom Lim had studied under at the Architectural Association in London and Harvard's Graduate School of Design. At Harvard, Lim had also met Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki, who by the mid-1960s had become a protagonist of the ‘megastructure' movement, which proposed large-scale, mixed-use, and fexible urban-architectural ensembles. Lim, Tay, and Koh articulated these views and their applicability to the context of post-colonial and rapidly urbanising Asia as members of the Singapore Planning and Urban Research Group (SPUR). 

As DP's frst project, these infuences coalesced in the design for People's Park Complex. Conceptualised as a wide commercial and retail podium and single residential slab block, DP's proposal integrated a series of ‘City Rooms' – large interior atriums designed for the gathering of "people from all classes, different walks of life, young and old, poor and rich" – that sought to reinstate the civic quality of the old People's Park. Having theorised the City Room several years prior, Maki reportedly visited the People's Park Complex site and exclaimed, "We theorised, and you people are getting it built!" 

DP's civic ambition was mirrored in the design of human-scale interior spaces: bridges, balconies, and interior ‘facades' created spaces that were simultaneously "large, intimate, and informal." These architectural features were appended by an ensemble of interior kiosks, illuminated signage, public furniture, and multi-colour prismatic lamps, whose total effect was to create an intense, vibrant, and civic interior ‘streetscape'. Commenting on the City Room following its completion, Singapore Herald editor Francis Wong stated that "I know of no other private building in Singapore (or public one for that matter) in which commercial functionalism and social welfare are so happily combined."

The residential slab block, featuring alternating sets of one- and three-bedroom units, also demonstrated a concern for humanising new forms of high-rise apartment living. Common access corridors every fve foors, serviced by articulated stair and lift cores, were designed as ‘streets in the air', appended by a "community area" for residents to socialise. In earlier, though ultimately unrealised design iterations, the podium rooftop and slab undercroft were also envisioned as communal spaces, featuring lush planting, a creche, meeting rooms, games rooms, and open-air playground. 

DP also adopted a distinctly late-modern approach to construction and fnishing, focusing on honest structural and material expression. The building featured pre-cast ribbed reinforced concrete façade panels, whose fnishes, alongside cast-in-situ structural elements, were originally left exposed.

Conclusion

When People's Park Complex was completed in 1972, it stood as a new urban monument for a rapidly modernising and newly independent Singapore. The building became quickly enmeshed in the social fabric of an evolving Chinatown, continuing the site's legacy as both a mercantile and social hub. Today, People's Park Complex is under threat from the same forces of modernisation through which it was incepted. Redevelopment pressure, an evolved commercial environment, and demands for new forms of living, shopping, and working have raised the prospect of People's Park being razed and rebuilt once again. However, as one of the most signifcant works in the canon of Singaporean modern architecture, and in the context of the climate crisis, we are obligated to envision alternatives to demolition and redevelopment. Instead, we must fnd ways to adapt People's Park Complex to new conditions while preserving its enduring architectural, historical, social, and environmental values. 

 

Part2 - The Pearl of People's Park — A Position Paper on the Conservation of People's Park Complex

Introduction

People's Park Complex (PPC) launched its frst two en-bloc sale attempts in 2018 and 2023. Docomomo Singapore published a statement in response and embarked on an advocacy campaign calling for the conservation of PPC, including walking tours showcasing the urban connectivity of the building's City Room, and conducted workshops to refect and cogitate on PPC's signifcance and possibilities.

This Position Paper is a year-long cumulative effort of members and volunteers of Docomomo Singapore, who rigorously debated, researched and brainstormed about the past, present and future of PPC.

The Position Paper can be downloaded in entirety from<https://www.docomomo.sg/happenings/a-position-paper-on-the-conservation-of-peoples-park-complex-post-1>

Conserving the First City Room

Conceptualised initially by Fumihiko Maki, pioneer of the Japanese Metabolist movement and Pritzker Prize laureate, the City Room refers to an interiorised public space for both planned and spontaneous events. The City Rooms of PPC played a crucial civic role as a community space sheltered from the tropical weather, hosting public talks, performances and exhibitions. PPC was a groundbreaking project that not only successfully materialised the concept of City Rooms, but also proved its viability.

Conserving the Heart of People's Park

People's Park Square, bounded by OG Building, People's Park (HDB) and PPC, is lauded as "one of the most successful urban spaces in Singapore." The designers of PPC modulated the building's massing and street-level interface in response to the Square, creating a seamless network of connections to the interior streets and City Rooms of PPC, and through to the wider streetscape of Chinatown. Such sensibilities anchor PPC as a crucial placemaking node in the precinct and exemplar of community-oriented urbanism.

Conserving the Modernist Layer of Chinatown

PPC was among the pilot urban renewal projects by the Urban Renewal Department, predecessor of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA). Located on the site of the fre-razed People's Park Market within the planning area of Precinct South 1 (S1), the mixed-use development was envisioned as the new nucleus of Chinatown's community and small businesses. With the contemporaneous S1 project Pearl Bank Apartments demolished, PPC remains the sole private post-independence modernist landmark commemorating the success story of urban renewal and nation-building.

Summary of Recommendations

Docomomo Singapore strongly advocates the gazetting of PPC for conservation, in recognition of its intrinsic architectural, urban and social signifcance as one of post-independent Singapore's most important modernist buildings. Even in the event of PPC's en bloc sale, rather than the conventional demolish-and-redevelop model, the environmentally sustainable approach of rehabilitation and adaptive reuse should be fully embraced. 

Key Elements & Principles for Retention

This position paper has identifed, at the urban level, PPC's Podium and Slab massing along with its heterogeneous mix of uses, its internal City Rooms, and its urban envelope facing People's Park Square, The Majestic Theatre and Eu Tong Sen street as character-defning elements to be retained. Doing so preserves the legibility and integrity of the original architecture.

Process & Policy Strategies

The strategy proposes a policy direction that aims to strike a balance between conservation and commercial prerogatives, with attendant incentives to spur the participation of private developers whilst ensuring that they see themselves as custodians of PPC - protecting the legibility of the complex whilst adapting it for refreshed relevance.

Programmatic Strategies

New programming should take into account the urban civic role of PPC within Chinatown's ecosystem, and incorporate community-oriented spaces and small businesses, possible including existing ones. The programmatic reconfguration of PPC presents an opportunity to address evolving societal needs. Tapping upon the proximity to the Singapore General Hospital (SGH) and the Outram transport network, one proposal is to integrate new assisted living facilities into the programme mix as a viable option of ‘aging in place, aging in community'.

Building-Level Strategies

The building-level strategies illustrate the possibilities for intensifcation while ensuring that key elements of the building are retained. The Gross Floor Area (GFA) increase and locations proposed for intensifcation works, such as the existing carpark or the rear of the podium, lend fexibility and viability to new commercial needs.

Precinct-Level Strategies

The conservation of PPC benefts the larger precinct, beyond its building boundaries. It proposes to stitch up the various green networks within the Pearl's Hill Masterplan and to strategically allocate additional GFA derived from the conservation of PPC for greater heritage and community use.

 

Figures

People's Park Complex, 1973. (Source: DP Architects: 50 Years Since 1967)

1847 View of Chinatown from Peorl's Hill by JT Thomson (Source: National Archives of Singapore)

1885 Police Courts at Dunman Green (Hong Lim Green) (Source: National Archives of Singapore)

1893 Map of Singapore Town, Close up of Pearl's Hill and People's Park (Source: National Archives of Singapore)

1960s People's Park Market (Source: National Archives of Singapore)

196s Lorange Plan (Source: Urban Redevelopment Authority)

1962 People's Park Market looking towards Pearl's Hill Police Barracks (Source: NLB)

1963 Ring City Plan (Source: URA)

1965 Precinct S1 (Source: HDB Annual Report)

1967 Aerial View of S1 Outram Park Housing Estate (Source: HDB)

1967 Park Road Housing Development (Source: HDB) 

1975c_URA Annual Report 74-75_Aerial View of Precinct S1

1970 Drawing of Maki's City Room (Source: Twitter ArchadeLDN) 

1970s People's Park Atrium (Source: DP Architects)

1973 People's Park Complex City Room (Source: National Archives of Singapore)

1973-4 People's Park Square (Source: HDB Annual Report) 

1980_NAS_PPC Bridge to Pagoda Street

1990_NAS_PPC City Room