Architecture studio WOHA has added a perforated-aluminium extension to a 1930s building to create a hotel that is "very mindful of the history" in Singapore.
Named 21 Carpenter, the hotel is located on the edge of Singapore's Chinatown area in a refurbished building that was built in 1936 as a place where Chinese labourers could send letters and money home to their families.
WOHA combined a traditional building and a modern extension for 21 Carpenter
"This is one of the original remittance houses of Singapore, and the Chinese labourers would come here to send their money back home," WOHA public relations manager Lin Bolt explained during a tour of the building.
"Most of these labourers were illiterate, so they couldn't read or write themselves," she added. "But here in Chinatown, you had a lot of letter writers who were classically trained, so they would tell the letter writers what they wanted to say to their families." The boutique hotel's perforated aluminium facade has an abstract pattern
Chinese remittance houses in Singapore were originally established to let workers in the Chinese community send money and letters home.
The studio considered this history when adding the new extension to the building, which measures 2,750 square metres and now houses the 48-room boutique hotel 21 Carpenter.
WOHA added a number of phrases discovered in the labourers' letters, such as 'day and night when will we reunite', to the new aluminium facad...