CON(TEMPORARY) DWELLING IN SHOPHOUSES: STAGING DOMESTICITY THROUGH THE PERCEPTION OF THE ARCHITECT

Abstract

This dissertation explores the notion of domesticity in Singapore shophouses today. It seeks to investigate the concept of staging domesticity through the perception of the architect, who performs the contemporary residential living in the conserved typology. Presently, the shophouse is generally recognized as a domestic dwelling figure, having been established with historic images of the populous deplorable shophouses to the lavished dwelling townhouses. As such, the shophouses are emoted with dedication of familial ideologies, practices, rituals and materials, constructing itself as an established domesticated house. Its domesticity still lingers, or rather represented as conservation, within the realm of the city’s urban planning, in hope of providing a sense of identity of a place. iv Able to conform to the surrounding needs of the society, cultural and economic environment, the dynamic conservation structure is staged to accommodate contemporary dwelling to perform the ‘ideal’ home. With the shift in domesticity, most of them houses temporary inhabitants, leaving the role to the architect to convey the domestic space. That being so, it is no longer the conventional notions of familial practices and pious ideologies that arranges the space but the architect staging his interpretations. Along with the image of the shophouse as the domestic character, the notion of domesticity in the house will be examined through the interpretation of the architect in three different scenes: ‘production of the stage’ documenting the concepts and ‘faction’ of the house; ‘portraits of the home’ representing or ‘romanticizing’ scenes of the house through its architectural images; and lastly ‘narrating the domestic stage’ portraying the architect dramatic presentation of spaces in the traditional typology with the contemporary scene. This dissertation explores the notion of domesticity in Singapore shophouses today. It seeks to investigate the concept of staging domesticity through the perception of the architect, who performs the contemporary residential living in the conserved typology. Presently, the shophouse is generally recognized as a domestic dwelling figure, having been established with historic images of the populous deplorable shophouses to the lavished dwelling townhouses. As such, the shophouses are emoted with dedication of familial ideologies, practices, rituals and materials, constructing itself as an established domesticated house. Its domesticity still lingers, or rather represented as conservation, within the realm of the city’s urban planning, in hope of providing a sense of identity of a place. iv Able to conform to the surrounding needs of the society, cultural and economic environment, the dynamic conservation structure is staged to accommodate contemporary dwelling to perform the ‘ideal’ home. With the shift in domesticity, most of them houses temporary inhabitants, leaving the role to the architect to convey the domestic space. That being so, it is no longer the conventional notions of familial practices and pious ideologies that arranges the space but the architect staging his interpretations. Along with the image of the shophouse as the domestic character, the notion of domesticity in the house will be examined through the interpretation of the architect in three different scenes: ‘production of the stage’ documenting the concepts and ‘faction’ of the house; ‘portraits of the home’ representing or ‘romanticizing’ scenes of the house through its architectural images; and lastly ‘narrating the domestic stage’ portraying the architect dramatic presentation of spaces in the traditional typology with the contemporary scene. By the domestic interpretation of the architect, the following study does not seek to suppress domesticity with the notion of contemporary living. Instead, with the insights of the architect, one may challenge the traditional nominative understanding of it, in juxtaposing the contemporary stage. Eventually, rationalizing the alternative content of staging the ‘ideal home’ through the contemporary dwelling in the established domesticated character.