pykett-penang: October 2012

On Oct 31, 2012 12:35 PM, "limcheoksiang" <limcheoksiang@gmail.com> wrote:

Subject: Getz Bros & Co (S) Pte. Ltd.

http://www.getz.com.sg/page.php?lvl1=6&lvl2=49&pageid=50

Sent from my iPad

Laureate Prof Dr Ar JIMMY C S LIM, SIA Getz Prize Citation by PAM President, 17th October 2012

When I was asked to say a few words about the SIA-GETZ Architecture Prize 2012 Laureate recipient, I accepted immediately as I am truly honored and delighted to be given the task.

I first knew the recipient over 30 years ago after I graduated from university and returned home to Malaysia to register myself as a PAM graduate member and subsequently attended to some of his talks and lectures. And of course he was also PAM President (1991-1993).

He is a man of many talents and faces: Master Architect, Conservationist, Urban Planner, Interior Designer and as what one would say, A Man of All Seasons.

Being presented as Master Architect by Mastercard in the early 90's landed himself into a host of problems with both the Malaysian Board of Architects and public controversy and even ruffled a few feathers in Singapore. But he rode the storm and lived through that period in his usual combative manner. It is ironic that today, Architects can be the face to represent products but still cannot label oneself as a Master of our craft.

Way before Green and Sustainability became the current buzz words, in the 80's he was already pushing the sustainable and green agenda in his design work.

The idea of orientation, passive cooling, natural and through ventilation, and use of local materials were all factors that he carefully considered in his architecture.

Three landmark houses of his come to mind, his own house, the Schneider House and the Walian House, which exemplify the best of his body of work.

The Schneider and Walian Houses epitomize the best in tropical house design, with the innovative use of timber, the soaring roof and the open plan design. The open-plan living spaces and the outdoor shower that open to the skies are all features that are being copied in the many current so-called Balinese and tropical houses.

His own house, a 1960's developer spec house, that has been re-modeled by him to beyond recognition, is organic as it is never finished as he has been adding on to it in bits and pieces for the last 30 years. His house is a mix-and-match of timber and bricks and canton floor tiles, but delightfully so, of old discarded timber structures, doors and windows and broken tiles and ceramic floor tiles, all cleverly re-cycled and re-used.

The story goes that if you are demolishing an old building, you just send the discarded old materials to his house and he would find a use for them. The old louvered windows that we threw out from the PAM Centre at Jalan Tangsi were salvaged by him and guess what! On one of our visits to his house, we saw them installed as windows.

Similarly the old ceramic tiles that he salvaged from a house in Penang were broken up and painstakingly re-assembled in an artistic sunburst pattern at his entrance porch.

When asked whether he had obtained the Certificate of Fitness for the extensive extensions made to his house, he laughed and replied that his house is still undergoing renovation exercise, so that the application for CF is still premature.

This is Jimmy Lim Cheok Siang for you! Full of tricks, for remember, he was born in the year of the Monkey.

However and in whichever way that you see him, Jimmy Lim is regarded as one of the pioneers in the search for a Malaysian architectural idiom. Over the years, he has worked closely with craftsmen of the trade in mutual partnership.

He is an early proponent regarding the primary use of locally derived materials in his architecture. He showed a deep regard for the confluence of natural light, vernacular building technology, material and textural quality at a time when his contemporaries were more concerned about imported architecture means and processes. Jimmy, practising architecture under his own terms, took architecture as seriously as it deserved, to the chagrin of most other regional practitioners.

Today his work and his influence have endured and encourage future exploration and developments with future generation.

Prof Ar. Jimmy Lim Cheok Siang, you rightly deserve the 2012 SIA-GETZ Architecture Prize. I, PAM, and definitely all Malaysians are very proud of you.

Congratulations!

Speech by the Laureate of the SIA Getz Prize for Emergent Asian Architecture.
Wednesday 17 October 2012.

President SIA, Ar Theodore Chan, President PAM, (Malaysian Institute of Architects) Ar. Saifuddin Ahmad, President Getz Group, Ray Simkins, Guest of Honour Viny Maas, distinguish guests, friends, good evening.

Appreciations.
Winning an Award like this is an important mile-stone in any Architect's career. It is with admiration for the SIA and Getz Group's intentions for initiating this Architectural recognition, I say thank you. Also more importantly, my heartfelt appreciation to my peers Ar Lok Wooi Kuan from Kuala Lumpur, Ar. Cheah Kok Ming, Ar Tan Kay Ngee and Ar Lee May Anne, all from Singapore, who have nominated and supported my nomination. It is because of their faith in me, that I am standing here to-night. Thank you.

Arch Journey linking history to sustainability..
Architecture begins with a simple vision of wanting to create beautiful spaces for People to enjoy, yet complementing the environment. The iconic expression is always a manifestation of its spatial celebration internally.

Nikolas Prevsner, in the introduction to his book "History of European Architecture" in explaining that a bicycle shed is a building but not architecture; however, a Gothic Cathedral is Architecture, made a poignant point. So what is Architecture?

The bicycle shed is a product of the Industrial revolution. Out of necessity it was invented, the frame made of steel and the tyres of rubber. Making steel was the first industrial process that spewed carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Rubber is a sustainable material derived from a renewable source. The Gothic Cathedrals were usually built of stones and timber. Often stones from demolished churches that stood on the site were recycled. Re-cycling is not a new concept. Stones and timber are sustainable materials. The cathedrals took the people many years to build using simple tools and no mechanised equipment, leaving hardly any carbon foot print in the atmosphere.

Aquiring Arch knowledge.
Architecture was new science to Malaya. The then Malaya consisted of the Federated Malaya States and the Straits Settlements of Singapore, Penang and Malacca. The students were sent off to Commonwealth countries, UK, Australia or NZ, to be educated.

This was to be the first stage of globalisation. After acquiring knowledge they returned home, that is the second stage of globalization. Back home they applied what they had learnt. Sadly in some cases there was no application, only regurgitation.

Architecture of Humility and Tai Chi of Architecture.
After returning from Sydney, I went through a period to re-orientate myself to understand the peculiarities of the local situation; whereby I adopted the architectural approach, referred to as the "Architecture of Humility" to be followed by the "Tai-chi of Architecture".

Prostrated on the ground in Humility we see everything at the ground level. In this position we learn about culture, tradition, climate, the environment, people, etc. to understand what they mean and how they function in an interrelated manner with the rest of the socio-economic pattern. After a complete understanding of the situation we are able to engage in the Tai Chi of architecture whereby we seek the strength of the opposing entity to overcome it.

Meaning of Architecture.
For me Architecture is not only about icons, 'bottom-line' profits or aesthetics, but the human factor. These buzz words have been bandied around so much that they have become meaningless. For me,

Architecture is about People,
People are about Life,
Life is about Living, and
Living is about Enjoying.
Enjoying what Nature has given us.
It therefore follows that Architecture is about

Enjoying and protecting Nature; and
What Nature has given us.

This is the first lesson about sustainability.

My Architecture.in the forefront.
My architecture has always dwelled on the periphery of the mainstream architectural style, exploring ideas which were never popular at that time. Doing architecture that is responsive to the environment; heritage, conservation and preservation of heritage, understanding vernacular architecture, arts and crafts tradition, climate, use of recycled building materials, comfort levels, awareness of energy consumption, investigating 'architecture without walls', etc. was not fashionable, not so long ago. With the present global concern about sustainability, energy conservation, carbon emission, we have unwittingly found ourselves thrust to the forefront of this crusade.

About our projects.
Our early project the Walian House, was experimentation with the concept of 'Architecture without Walls' for the tropics. It was to be our first venture into the realm of sustainable architecture without realising its significance then. It was to be the harbinger of things to come, "green" architecture, passive cooling comfort, minimising carbon emission and footprint etc…. Many of our projects had earned us local as well as International architectural accolades. The Salinger House in Kajang won us the coveted Aga Khan Award in 1998.

Tropics, what do we know about it?
What do we know about the tropics, the forests, hills and the seas?
The temperate zones have four seasons. As compared to the temperate zones what do we know about the tropics? Very little, except that it is hot and humid. The tropics have only two seasons; "hot and wet" and the other is "hot, wet and more wet".

The Sun
In the tropics,
we have a lot of Sun,
With the Sun, it is very hot.
To keep cool,
We need a shady roof,
To keep the roof cool,
we need shady trees,
With shady trees,
there are lots of leaves,
With lots of leaves,
we do not need any gutters and downpipes.

The RAIN
In the tropics we have alot of rain.

When it rains it pours,
We do not need gutters.
To keep ourselves dry,
we need a roof over our heads, and
walls to keep the rain out.
When the rain stops it gets hot.

That is when we do not need the walls,
for air to flow through.
When it rains again
we need the walls.
This is the contradiction of life in the tropics.

"Thinking out of the box" may mean challenging existing norms and entrenched values, which I often found to be troublesome, as not many people were prepared to accept them. It has for a long time been an accepted practice that all buildings must have gutters and downpipes. When I first removed gutters from my buildings my plans were not accepted by the Local Authorities in Malaysia. Now I know for a fact that Singapore does not allow gutters in residential buildings. I am vindicated. We have also experimented with operable windows and "disappearing" walls. These are only beginning to be accepted.

Understanding and protecting the Tropics
As a result of our curiosity, to understand the tropics we studied and listened to its rhythm and heartbeats. This culminated in ideas for "The rites of the Tropics"; our continuing search for meaningfulness in our region, environment and therefore our architecture. The Rites of the Tropics embodies the essence of tropical celebration into twelve areas for inclusion into our architecture.

This continuing search for answers to our questions about tropical architecture is only made possible by the encouragement and endorsement of our friends, clients and like minded people from all works of life. Architecture is a crowded profession but at times we find ourselves in the wilderness. To survive in the wilderness one needs to be vigilant. In so doing we are consciously maintaining an awareness and concern for our environment. The environment is a global heritage and inheritance.

Using Timber from the rainforests.
As a practising Architect in the tropics I seek new directions and ideas from our built and natural environment. The forests that produced timber easily and rapidly caught my interest. They are there and inexpensive to use, why not use them in deference instead of the norm, "RC(reinforced concrete) with brick in-fills". That was so years ago. Today timber is one of the most sought after and valuable materials in building. To be able to construct a timber building today is a luxury.

With the exorbitant cost of timber and its increasing scarcity, I started to explore alternative sustainable substitutes, using more re-cycled timber, bamboo or smaller sized timber slats to construct larger composite components for my architecture. Many of these ideas are still in their experimental stage and need public acceptance.

That the tropical rainforest and rainforest products are singled out as endangered requiring 'global' protection seems lopsided. After all why aren't the forests of the Spanish plains replanted? The trees were chopped to build ships for the invasion of South America. There are very few Kauri trees in the North Island of NZ; where have they all gone? I am not advocating the indiscriminate deforestation like in some parts of Malaysia, but a genuine collaboration across borders to protect the forests.

Conservation and Heritage
From this perspective founding the Badan Warisan Malaysia, (Heritage Malaysia Trust), an NGO, together with some like-minded people, was part of the natural process of one's architectural appreciation. It is important to preserve our heritage for posterity, something like a memory bank for a city or country to remember its past. It serves as an important repository for research.

Institute activities.
As part of Life's evolutionary process, we are under an obligation to pass on our knowledge to future generations. The architectural profession has to perpetuate itself. I was very involved in various capacities in the Malaysian Institute of Architects, eventually becoming its President in 1992.

Mentoring.
By virtue of our profession, architects are compelled to be educators, educating the public and students about environmental protection, and the larger global responsibility of protecting the earth's resources. We must be involved in mentoring future architects, students, interacting with architectural trainees, pointing them in the right direction, generating in them social conscience. Protecting the urban and natural environment is a commitment. It is a commitment that embraces a sense of responsibility, urgency and diligence.

Conclusion.
Preserving our heritage, both our man-made and natural environment are issues which fall within our responsibilities as architects. This is part of our social responsibility. We are morally compelled to hand over to the future what we received from the past in a good shape - no less. We are but temporal custodians for the future. Conserving our heritage represents a continuing challenge to humanity. It is as always,

Today was Yesterday's Tomorrow,
as,
Today will be Tomorrow's Yesterday.