Tun Tan Cheng Lock Centre for Architectural and Urban Heritage

DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE – 50^th ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATIONS

Soft Launch of Tun Tan Cheng Lock Centre for Architectural and Urban Heritage (TTCL-Center)

Date: 21 November 2008

Venue: 54 and 56 Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock, Malacca

In the line towards progress, the Department of Architecture has not jettison the awareness of the roots and culture of place. A generous donation from Ms Agnes Tan, the daughter of Tun Tan Cheng Lock, enabled the purchase of two houses along Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock in Malacca. They are now being restored and adaptively re-used for the careful study of conservation, analysis of construction techniques and a close study of architectural culture and heritage. After months of works, the Department of Architecture is organizing a soft launch on 21 November 2008 at 54 and 56 Jalan Tun Tan Cheng Lock, Malacca.

The Centre is envisioned to be a resource center and a field school with facilities for academic exchanges among scholars and students coming from all parts of the world. It is located strategically in the recently declared World Heritage City, Malacca where various civilizations met, blended, and manifested into the cosmopolitan characters of its architecture and urban culture along its history.

(Quoted from Note of the HOD-Architecture)

A study on Urban & Architectural Conservation in Penang, Malaysia

(ar5756. completed in 2006)

Abstract

Georgetown of Penang, founded in 1786 by Captain Francis Light is famous with cultural diversity, old colonial buildings and traditional roofscapes mixed with new high-rise. The Town has been experienced ups and downs of political, socio-economic change last few centuries. Up to now, conservation of urban fabric and cultural heritage is the burning question of the day after UNESCO returned “the Historic centres of Malacca and Penang dossiers” in 2005. The aim of the research, thus, was to understand current conservation of Penang’s built heritage as well as to assess dossier of Penang historic center. Practically, analytical process, which relied on UNESCO criteria, implied many actual causes influenced the submitted application’s content. Therefore, to deal with these problems, appropriate measures are proposed to definitely tackle these problems in the revising dossier of Penang for the second submission.

Keywords: Penang’s built heritage, dossier of Penang historic centre, conservation

“Spirit” of Hanoi Ancient Urban Area and Its Heritage

(Published in: Construction Planning Journal, Vol. 22 [4] 2006, pp.39-41)

Summary

Ancient “spirit” for anybody, it may be whatever is going to be existed, such as a vendor, unsteady street, an old house surrounding … They are physical basic partials created ancient “spirit” long time ago.

Ancient streets at present have become partly indispensable in each of us line an ancient street hidden a magnanimous period with a lifestyle, culture, belief and changes towards better future.

“Spirit” of present ancient house is intangible value which had in the past. If we can not see the value for preservation, the house will be lost its actual attraction. To push “spirit” into the house is the necessary must be carefully considered and respected “speakable things” to speak out the value of space, time, unique lifestyle of specific house.

Examining Conservation Possibilities on Reciprocal Relations between the built Environment and Heritage User: A case study of 36 Old Streets Quarter in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Ngo Minh Hung, Wong Yunn Chii, Heng Chye Kiang

(Accepted in: HERITAGE 2008 International Conference, Portugal)

Abstract

The Old Quarter of Hanoi, implies the commercial area- “Kẻ Chợ” outside the Royal Citadel, is considered the best place to experience the spirit of the one thousand year old Hanoi with values- tangible: urban fabric, tube-house architecture and historic-cultural- religious buildings; – intangible: lifestyle and ethnic standard of natives, traditional guilds with its streets (Hàng) bearing the names of the goods manufactured on them. Change of the built environment in the Ancient Quarter has been challenging heritage users (local authority, native, merchant) before current market-oriented mechanism of mega-city like Hanoi. Over the past 25 years, such three pilot projects of building preservation within Hanoi Ancient Quarter (HAQ)- covering over 800 relics that need to be urgently preserved, have been conducted by applied “reproducible preservation method” with the international assistance.

To Hanoi city, community participation plays a vital role in retaining the built heritages, which provide significant functions to the users – who enable to grasp opportunities in use of physical settings. The research aims to assess reciprocal relationship of both key elements (material elements and user’s behavior) in heritage environment (in-outdoor and sharing spaces) of 36 Old Streets Quarter that affords inhabitants (i) perceiving the environment qualities to spring potential opportunities in (ii) utilizing physical settings and; (iii) shaping variously spatial forms; and a cross- comparison of those layers is logically analyzed to formulate a notion of “interplay- preservation” at town and architectural level. It argues that for a sustainable development that would retain the identity of the heritage city, a ground-up framework (GUF) is conceptualized to emphasis on integrating actual heritage condition with traditional methods of indigenous community is recommended.

Keyword: community participation, potential possibilities, GUF, urban heritage

Presentation Slides at 6th APRU Conference, Oregon- USA

Re-planning structure and Socializing conservation of “Hanoi Ancient Quarter” towards Sustainable Urban Development in Vietnam.

(Full paper- Presented in: Annual Association of Pacific Rim Universities Conference, 2005. University of Oregon, USA)

Abstract

Hanoi Ancient Quarter called 36 Old Streets Quarter is just recognized as one of National Heritages including hundreds of valued relics from year 1010 to now. Urban development is being changed town structure and caused social problems loosing its initiated identity. To answer questions “What, Why and How?” so the aim of this paper is to discover historical and urban development process of the Ancient Quarter in terms of socio-economic characteristics, town conceptualizations in the past, as well as to review and evaluate social and community’s efforts in last ten years by applying “dots analytic system” (DAS) which based on sustainable urban design models. In order to re-plan structure and socialize preservation works, some key solutions of sustainable urban development and design are proposed in order to positively conserve and develop original image “Ancient Quarter” of Hanoi City towards sustainable urban development in the future

Key words: sustainable urban development and design, urban planning, conservation, socialization of conservation, DAS’s system.