Gardens by the Bay, Singapore
A cutting Edge Mega Project
'Gardens by the Bay' in Singapore is the latest green legacy as it seeks to transform the city into scintillating sets of garden. 'Garden by the Bay' is Singapore's premier urban outdoor recreation space and a national icon which was intended to create a Metropolis of tropical greenery.
The project is an intensification of the green landscape matrix of streetscape greenery; parks, gardens and nature reserves linked together by a network of more than 200km of park connectors across the entire Island. It nearly took 40 years to complete the whole project.
The Gardens by the Bay comprises three distinct but connected waterfront gardens: Bay South (54 hectares), Bay East (32 hectares) and Bay Central (15 hectares). The Gardens emanate out from the Bay South Gardens at the very heart of the Singapore Downtown and encircle the Marina Reservoir like a green necklace, thereby creating an intimate and seamless interface between land and water. Intension of development of the greenery aspects in the city, the land was occupied for this huge nature project rather than using it for commercial development.
Singapore earns Green
Singapore the Island place also proved to be one of the green saviours Country. The Gardens launch in the city changed into the realm of distinctive global cities with environmental sustainability and quality living as its distinctive hallmarks. Gardens of the Bay not only made an International branding but also recognized as investor’s and human talents. It is to be a stake in the world’s premier tropical city in a Garden. It is an attractive and desirable part of the Singapore. Gardens of the Bay are dedicated to every Singaporeans as their space to make it meaningful and memorable activities. It is also considered as ‘National Garden’ to Singaporeans.
The master plan is designed to facilitate a wide range of activities and attractions that can be programmed through a 24 hour period and through the year.
Lion Garden
The cosmopolitan sanctuary achieved through the construction of an intelligent new infrastructure and management system that allows the nurturing and cultivation of plants. The infrastructure centres on a hub of buildings and facilities plugged into the landscape. The centre piece of this hub is the cluster of cooled conservatories and associated facilities rising out of the ground and perched along the edge of the Marina. The artificial sustained world contrasts with lush semi natural vegetation that is allowed to colonized and grow between the Gardens and new Infrastructure. An armature of the infrastructure connects from the hub to the entrance to the gardens. These pathways distribute people through the gardens and provide a network of energy, cooling devices, irrigation, water treatment and waste recycling systems connecting back to the Hub buildings.
The architecture for the project is deliberately organic and the buildings follow a common language of form and structured and materials. Each building is distinctive in scale and profile. The landscape of for the project also works off the contrast between the alien and inserted infrastructure of pathways, gardens and associated features as opposed to the backdrop of semi-natural regeneration and parkland.
The structure of the Garden is analogous to the orchid in the way it grows and colonized from this host infrastructure. It is epiphytic and responsive to the very specific conditions created by the hub.
Moon Gardens
If the Lion Gardens are a fusion of digital technology, horticulture, modern materials, colour, activities and culture. The moon Gardens are the counterpoint. They are passive/analogue technologies, natural systems, biodiversity, reflection and luscious plantings and aquatic jewels. The plan is structure around a spine of water lined by new landscape, buildings and gardens. The central spine of dramatic landscapes is likely to be a little scary in places. A sequence of dramatic ecological towers rises from this waterway’s edge like coastal pinnacles and creates an extraordinary 3 dimensional landscape along the corridor and establishes a unique profile to the Moon Gardens when seen from the reservoir.
Tiger Gardens
The silver of land separates the city from the reservoir. It offers a respite from the dense, busy hard urban development that backs the water edge and a corridor to connect along the water edge and a corridor to connect along the water edge to other sectors. This is about bursting out from the grey city grid into a vibrant world of nature, life, colour and variety. It is also about creating magnets of attraction and enjoyment for refreshment and delight.
One way achieving this is to introduce a whole new language of distinctive structures and shelters to redefine the water front including jetties, landing points and fishing stands. The structures are planned as a family of related but not identical forms using cables, mesh and inflatable technologies. The intension is to incorporate planting onto all these structure to enhance the garden concept.
The cooled Conservatories
Rather combining both cool-moist and cool dry environments in a single structure. It has two distinct forms allowing the differences between plant life in these conditions to be contrasted and explored. The composition of the two forms, generated from the same geometry, creates a landscape in itself with existing circulation and amenity spaces around and in between them.
The curving forms of the glasshouses enclose a dramatic inner court. It shared facilities be located. Access to this air-conditioned space will be beneath the higher landscaped ramp and additionally through life cores which piece the space from above.
Set out on a linear axis from east to west, the glasshouses incorporate sunshades arranged north to south to respond to the sun’s path across the site. One time, the glasshouses require 50% shading in order to control the temperature within. The shading also responds to the orientation of the structure with the southern facades more heavily shaded while the northern faced retain almost total transparency. This near-vertical glass facade on the cool-dry glasshouse acts as a prism, refracting light from the water.
Cool Dry Glasshouse
The cool-dry glasshouse is larger, its interior filled with towering ‘stacks’ of planting. Entering into the space, the visitors experience the planting from an extraordinary variety of perceptive. Planted walkways radiate around the perimeter, leading visitors above, under and through the main tree canopy in a spiral progression. The planting differ in scale, offering a changing intensity of experience and the opportunity to observe the plant life both from long range of different species, a ramp to one side climbing gradually along its elevation to allow close inspection of the planting.
Adjacent to the cool-dry house, the cool- moist glass house encloses a slightly smaller space, the centre piece of which is an artificial mountain. Visitors enter the glasshouse at ground level, moving through a slot cut into the centre of the mountain where a lift core provides direct access to the summit, where the spectacular long range views across Marina Channel to the Pinnacles of the Moon Gardens can be viewed.
The principle circulation within the cool-moist house is a spiralling ramp that leads visitors on a gentle 1km long promenade down through the space. Bridge links at several points allow access to ‘clearing’ on the mountainside, offering an opportunity to look at the planting up close and follow surface routes to the next bridge link.
Supertrees
The garden is defined by a cluster of Supertrees up to 50m high. Each trunk of the Supertrees is an amazing vertical garden. It is planted with ferns, orchids, climbers and other plants up to a height of around 30m to create an almost fantasy space topped by a series of beautiful canopies that provides shade and shelter from rain. There is access to an aerial walkway using lifts up the trunks of two of the Supertrees. This takes people up to a walkway some 35-40m up in the air from where they can look down over the gardens. At this level, the walkway connects the canopies and forms a circuit around the grove and the iconic structures at the heart of the gardens these are the Environment Engines for the cooled conservatories incorporating devices for water harvesting and storage and cooling, photovoltaic arrays, solar collectors, desiccant drying etc.
Flowers and dome
In the Flower Dome, it is an awe of nature. it replicates the cool-dry climate of Mediterranean regions like South Africa, California, other parts of Spain and Italy. Collection of plants under one roof can be found from deserts all over the world. It showcases the adaptations of plants to arid environments. Stop and smell the flowers in the colourful changing displays of the Flower Field. It reflects different seasons, festivals and themes.
Enjoy a cooling and leisurely stroll through the Flower Dome and experience the eerie profile of the baobabs, surrounded by fascinating succulents. Immerse the spectacular view of the Marina reservoir skyline, as embark on the journey through the Mediterranean Basin, South West Australia, South Africa, Central Chile and California. You will discover amazing plants and flowers from different corners of the globe and amazed by how different parts of the trees are used in daily lives across different cultures.
African Baobab (Adansonia digitata)
The African Baobab weighing more than 32 tons is the largest tree in the Flower Dome. This gigantic tree has many uses for its roots, hollow trunks, bark, wood, leaves, flowers and fruit. It is for, from building materials to food and medicine. Flowering at night, this species is pollinated by fruit bats, while terrestrial mammals like baboons and elephants disperse its fruits by passing the seeds through the digestive tract before germination.
Drunken Tree or Palo Borracho (Ceiba chodatii)
Related to the Kapok Tree of the Brazilian Amazon and Western Africa, the Drunken Tree's seeds are surrounded by smooth, light fibres that are usually collected to make pillows and cushions. Take a closer look at their amazing round trunks that are used to store water, and their beautiful ivory-coloured flowers, which are pollinated by hawk moths.
Ghost Tree (Moringa douhartii)
Originating from South-western Madagascar, the Ghost Tree is often cultivated at traditional tombs in local villages. Despite being related to the edible Horse Radish Tree from India. Its foliage, fruits and seeds are not consumed locally. Some cultures claim to use its aromatic sap as medicine for coughs and colds.
Woods are beautiful
Enter the Cloud Forest, a mysterious world veiled in mist; entirely different from the Flower Dome. A 35m tall mountain covered in lush vegetation shrouding the world’s tallest indoor waterfall showcases plant life from tropical highlands up to 2,000-metres above sea level.
Ascend to the mountaintop in comfort by lift before descending via two walkways in the clouds for an aerial view of the canopy and mountainside. It is unique biodiversity and geology of cloud forests and the environmental threats they face within the nine unique zones in this cool-moist Conservatory.
Dragonfly & Kingfisher Lake
The fascinating world exists beyond the surface of the lakes. More than a thing of beauty, the lakes are a rich source of aquatic life from fish to plants. These plants act as a natural eco-filter to cleanse water that has been captured from run-offs or pumped in from the connecting Marina reservoir. Filter beds comprising aquatic reeds are strategically located where the water enters and discharges from the lake system.
These aquatic plants also play a vital role in maintaining the right amount of nutrients in the lake by helping to absorb excess nitrogen and phosphorus, and to ensure better water quality. Take a stroll on the boardwalk of the Dragonfly Lake and discover more fascinating facts on the ecosystem.
Box Item
Project: Gardens by the Bay (Marina South)
Place: Singapore
Site Area: 540000 Square Meters
Completed in: 2012
Cost: SGD 1 billion
Client: National Parks Board (NParks)
Architect: CPG consultants and Wilkinson Eyre Architects
Environmental design: Atelier Ten
Structural Engineers: Atelier one
References
Profile: Wilkinson Eyre Architects
Wilkinson Eyre Architects, twice winners of the prestigious RIBA Stirling Prize, is one of the UK’s leading architecture practices. Its portfolio of bold, beautiful, intelligent architecture includes the giant, sustainably-cooled conservatories for the Gardens by the Bay in Singapore, the new Mary Rose Museum in the UK, the acclaimed temporary structure of the London 2012 Basketball Arena and the Guangzhou International Finance Center - currently the eighth tallest building in the world.
Wilkinson Eyre is responsible for a large portfolio of international projects and has designed highly successful projects in diverse market sectors including transport, the arts, commercial, infrastructure, masterplanning, bridge design, industrial, retail, leisure, educational, cultural and residential buildings, as well as component and systems design. Our architecture is based on an informed use of technology and materials, combining a commitment to the spirit of the new with a strong awareness of context.
From its beginnings in 1983 Wilkinson Eyre Architects has grown to a total of over 110 staff. Early projects included galleries for the Science Museum and award-winning transport buildings as part of the Jubilee Line extension at Stratford. At the same time Wilkinson Eyre established an unrivalled reputation for bridge design - most notably for the Stirling Prize-winning Gateshead Millennium Bridge.
The work of Wilkinson Eyre has been extensively published and exhibited throughout the world as part of major design exhibitions and as solo installations; and has received well over 200 design awards, short listings and commendations over the past ten years. The practice has published two monographs, Bridging Art and Science (2001) and Exploring Boundaries (2007). Both titles attempt to represent the philosophy behind the architecture: as a practice we like to use the latest technology in our buildings and we draw inspiration from both art and science, seeking an elegant simplicity that seems almost inevitable. We are keen to innovate and try to create something new with each project - each one is different, but there is a distinctive design approach which links all the work.