Thoughts on Malaysian architecture identity and design principles of Malayan architects co-partnership

Abstract

The lack of discourses, research and documentations on Malaysian architectural identity are among the factors that contributed to persistent misunderstanding of architecture identity and its association with political, economic and socio-cultural context of Malaysia. Therefore, the objective of the thesis is to understand architectural identity thoughts that led to architecture design befitting with political, economic and socio-cultural context of Malaysia. This thesis looks at existing concepts, theories, types and approaches of Malaysian architecture identity, and it reviews the historical development of the search for Malaysian architecture identity from 1950s to 1960s, a dawning period in the attempts by architects in Malaya to infuse meaning and value to a new nation. A local architecture firm, Malayan Architects Co-Partnership (MAC) highlighted by scholars and historians as successful in designing suitable architecture to Malaya's (later Malaysia) identity is engaged as the case study. The thesis employed an interpretive architectural historical methodology employing postrnodern paradigm as a basis for understanding meaning and values associated with architecture design. The study relies on literature review, speeches, interviews, archive documents, direct observation and building analysis. Data obtained which was triangulated revealed that thoughts on architecture identity are products of an architect's reflection of himself that is bounded by the external factors such as politic, economy and socio-culture. The study found that MAC's design principles is a synthesis of modern, vernacular and past tradition ideas encompassing three themes; adaptability, reinterpretation and realization of realities. Outcomes of the study extend existing views on Malaysian architecture identity and offer an architectural design approach that draw inspiration from the past architectural work. It also extended existing knowledge as it is a pioneering effort to document architectural identity thoughts in Malaysia and design principles of a local architecture firm as a step to reshaping the Malaysian national architecture identity.