Friday, September 21, 2007

Old Buildings, New Life

To preserve a historical site while demonstrating creativity in the restricted space, to me, that is living space. Some historical buildings are sited in busy financial hubs where space is a luxury item. To tear down buildings of such historical value can ignite many moral, cultural and historical debates. As such, many countries place great effort in doing something for their people and their history. Especially China.

In recent years, Beijing and Shanghai have shown signs of over-population. Sometimes when you wake up from your sleep and peer out from your window, you are unable to distinguish whether you are in America's Los Angeles or China's Beijing, or America's New York or China's Shanghai? Westerners depend on a variety of food, architectural, fashion and educational culture to capture the hearts of the world. If this carries on, will there merge another theme on globalisation?
Protecting history is the imperative of all governments, but it is a big and foolhardy project. Australia has restored many historical buildings. The one that stands out to me is a hotel owned by Singapore's GIC in Sydney, Australia. This hotel is some forty-floors high. It used to be a post office, and it has basically maintained its original look.

Fullerton hotel used to be our National Post Office Headquarters. Raffles Hotel and White Sands Square are both modeled according to historic buildings/sites.

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