BACKLANES AS SECONDARY TERRITORY : THE PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SPACE OF SHOPHOUSES IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

When talking about conservation in Singapore, one will easily relate it to the shophouses in places like Chinatown or Geylang. They will be reminded with the architectural elements like the five-foot way, timber louver windows and the pitch roof. Conservation is more than just keeping a façade. To be able to fully appreciate the beauty of a conservation area, equal amount of attention is required for the building as well as the spaces around it. However in the situation of Singapore, majority of the guidelines regarding the urban spaces are targeted towards the front of the shophouse only. In contrast, the backlanes, which are also an urban space within the conservation area, are often left unused. The backlanes we saw today are not a true representation of it usage in the past. Introduced to lessen the overcrowding problem in the early 1900, backlanes used to be an important communal open space within the congested shophouse environment. However with the change of usages to these shophouses, the role of the backlane is no longer essential in present context. Without a proper function, backlanes today are usually left unused. Nevertheless the backlanes are unique urban spaces due to their secluded nature behind the shophouses. Being secluded means that although backlanes are public spaces, general user will not want to venture into these areas. With low pedestrian movement along these backlanes, the spaces are commonly use by residents or staff living or working in these shophouses. By putting temporary furniture or pot plants along the backlanes, these people established ownership over the spaces. This form of claiming possession of public spaces for personal usage is the characteristic of a secondary territory. Backlanes which are always faced with this situation are therefore classified as a secondary territory while the shophouse and the front street are private and public territory respectively. For a conservation project to be considered as successful, the building or space must be able to reflect it historical value while catering to the modern needs. Therefore when one is designing for an adaptive reuse project, he must be able to extract out the key qualities that represent the original building before combining them with the new elements required for the new functions. This dissertation is to examine these qualities and identify what are the possibilities of using the backlanes for today social needs.