Where are Singapore’s Goods of Desire?

July 22, 2012

Hong Kong retail store Goods of Desire opened in Singapore two weeks back and I finally checked it out last night. The label, founded in 1996, sells an eclectic collection of goods ranging from clothing to homeware that are designed to be “quintessentially Hong Kong”. One of their most distinctive design approaches has been to appropriate everyday things from the city to create goods that represent Hong Kong.

I walked out of the store wondering, where is Singapore’s Goods of Desire? It’s not a difficult concept to execute and many Singapore designers have used a similar approach to design an array of Singapore-inspired products. One of the early pioneers is Casey Chen, who created the Taxi Lamp (2002) and the DynaGlo Lamp (2005). There’s also &Larry, who has designed various “Objects” that express Singapore’s identity. More recently, we have Singapore Souvenirs (2009), where a group of industrial designers explored 37 new concepts of what a Singapore memento could be. This has become a permanent project of design group triggerhappy.

Besides representing Hong Kong, Goods of Desire also designs products “to live better”, promoting a certain lifestyle. Again, Singapore has a generation of young designers doing just that. Uyii produces bags by hand because “in this world of mass production, there is a place for special designs with handmade touch”. Similarly, local label wheniwasfour wants to “play a part of the demographic that enjoys ‘slow living’, simple happiness”.

What is missing in Singapore at this point is some kind of “super label” that connects all these creations. Currently, small shops such as S U P E R M A M A and little dröm store carry many of these products, and design studio FARM, also commissions, produces and sells such products via its online store. However, to take these designs to the mass market, and even internationally, there needs to be a certain volume and presence.

I don’t think what Singapore lacks now is creative talent — there are many more labels that those I’ve listed — but rather someone or an entity who can offer the commercial expertise and financial backing. Just as Hong Kong has its Goods of Desire and Japan has MUJI, it’s only a matter of time before such a concept store emerges from the shores of Singapore.

Singapore’s 3G Graphic Designers

July 6, 2012

As with any community that has been around long enough, there are several generations that lie within it. Identifying this is useful in understanding why they act and think differently, and helps us predict what future generations of this community could be like.

In my latest book INDEPENDENCE: The history of graphic design in Singapore since the 1960s, I’ve categorised the graphic design community here to three generations, each having different values and thoughts about graphic design and its roles. Briefly, they are:

ZERO (prior to 1980s): These were the graphic artists working in advertising agencies, sign-makers, and freelance commercial artists. Many of them were artists trying to make a living or trained as technicians in Singapore’s first design school, Baharuddin Vocational Institute. Designers of this generation were essentially craftsmen who sold their artistic skills to businesses, usually for advertising purposes.
Examples: Hagley & Hoyle · Central Design

ONE (1980s-1997): Graphic designers of this era understood the role of good design in good business, and not just for advertising, but also in crafting a corporate image. This expanded role encouraged designers to professionalise so that they were taken seriously. These ideas came from several designs who received training overseas and returned to Singapore and started their own studios. Around the same time, the Singapore government also pushed local businesses to adopt design and take on a global market. The design industry in Singapore boomed during this period, until the 1997 Asian financial crisis.
Examples: Design Objectives · Su Yeang Design · Viscom Design

TWO (1997-???): The arrival of the computer in the 1990s and the the Internet in the 2000s accelerated the progress of young designers who bypassed the existing Singapore design scene, and hence a generation gap. They got ideas from overseas faster and could now easily carry them out on their own. By then, Singapore had embraced globalisation, and loosened up at home as a consequence. This created new opportunities for designers to work on a very different genre of design besides corporate work, and designers became part of a growing Singapore creative community. When the government acknowledged the importance of the creative industries for its future economy in the early 2000s, the torchlight was shone upon these young creatives who became recognised as the new face of Singapore design.
Examples: :phunk studio · Asylum · H55

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At this point in time, I’m unclear if we’ve seen the end of a second generation of Singapore’s graphic designers. In the last few years, many new design studios shave started up, but are they very different from their predecessors? It’s too early to tell.

Based on the age of studios, we could consider FARM (2005), silnt (2005), Couple (2007), Foreign Policy Design (2007), pupilpeople (2008) and Hjgher (2009) as one group, but how different are they from generation TWO? And when we compare these with the bumper crop of new studios last year — Somewhere Else, Studio Kaleido, ACRE, Roots, Relay Room, Terrain, STUDIO VBK, Swarm, Tofu — are they another group? I’m very keen to find out.

The Heartlands: Blk 230G, Hougang, Playgrounds

June 19, 2012

I’ve recently got myself involved in a series of work that revolved around the heartlands of Singapore.

AT OUR DOORSTEPS is a community project photographer Sam Kang Li started to get to know his neighbours better. He knocked on the doors of all the 44 units of the block he stayed in and photographed portraits of his neighbours at their doorstep. These portraits were exhibited in May at the void deck of his block and compiled to a block album I helped Kang Li put together.

On the left is the album cover, which took reference from the elements found in the block, including the distinct coloured tiles and the lift buttons.

Find out about At Our Doorsteps through this video he made in the midst of doing it, and another after the exhibition was held.

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MEET THE PEOPLE is a collection of videos that Samuel He put together over a few days in the run-up to the recent by-elections in Hougang. He wanted to reflect the voices of the people in the constituency by “eavesdropping” into their everyday conversations about the elections. During the hustings, he walked the constituency of Hougang, approaching residents to get them to talk about the elections, often putting his camera in front of them and letting it run till they forgot it was there.

Check out the videos here.

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MOSAIC MEMORIES: Remembering the playgrounds Singapore grew up in is an e-book I authored that contains stories of four Singaporeans, including the designer Mr Khor Ean Ghee, and their memories of old playgrounds in Singapore. Inside, you will also find portraits of the interviewees by Zakaria Zainal and an illustrated map by Wee Ho Gai of where the remaining old playgrounds are still standing today. This was a publication commissioned by the Singapore Memory Project as part of their “Drawn from Memory” series.

This e-book is the third time I’ve produced a piece related to my fascination with these old playgrounds that were designed and produced in Singapore. It began with an article I wrote for Singapore Architect in 2009, which was updated with even more details and reference in my most recent piece for FIVEFOOTWAY. Mosaic Memories comes from a very different angle, featuring the playground users instead of the designs.

You can download the e-book and read an interview I did with irememberSG!