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Mangrove, Kranji Park | PIX: DARREN SOH

To chance upon a pocket of space in land-scarce Singapore is to have fortuitously arrived at an in-between moment in the city-state’s relentless urban march—a pause after something was demolished; a pause before a construction site emerges.

In that moment, the land is emptied but not empty. The urban fabric has opened up a space for contemplation: to think outside the boundaries of a city so neatly delineated by its state planners and real estate developers. As Singapore builds itself up to house a projected population of 6.9 million people by 2030, such temporary voids offer us a momentary frontier of possibilities, before they become concretized as urban structures again.

➜ Read the rest at Design Observer

One Graphic Designer Challenges Viewers By Not Showing Any Work at His Retrospective

At the mid-career retrospective of graphic designer Hanson Ho last month, visitors might have been surprised to see not a single piece of work he created in the past 16 years.

Instead, the gallery walls were adorned with a salmon-colored semi-circle, a grey square, and framed black rectangles, amongst other simple shapes. These are the building blocks of the elemental and modernist creations by the Singaporean designer, better known as the founder of H55 studio. When Ho thought about looking back at the output of the studio he founded in 1999, he decided to pay homage to the aesthetic fundamentals of his practice instead of staging a “meaningless” show-and-tell exhibition.

➜ Read the rest at AIGA’s Eye on Design

Print: Here to Stay

That you are reading this report on a print design event online via a digital screen speaks volumes about the state of printed matter today. Once the default, print publishing has been challenged by the Internet and digital technology over the last decade – best summed up by the now cliché proclamation that “Print is Dead”.

Yet the medium has not just survived, but is enjoying a revival as witnessed by the well-attended “Print Design: Books, magazines, zines – here to stay!” event held recently at the National Design Centre. Veteran graphic designer Kelley Cheng of The Press Room, emerging design duo Sarah & Schooling, and magazine retailer Magpie’s founder Annabelle Fernandez were invited to make sense of print’s longevity. The quartet of print lovers offered a behind-the-scenes peek at how they produced and distributed printed publications before diving into a discussion moderated by Adib Jalal, director of Shophouse & Co, the organiser of this event.

➜ Read the rest at IndesignLive Singapore