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Lecture details
Reimagining Orchard Road
12 September 2017
4.00pm – 5.30pm. Registration from 3.30pm, seated by 4.00pm
MND Auditorium
Lecture video
Synopsis
How can shopping belts remain relevant with the growing popularity of online shopping and thriving suburban malls? Using Orchard Road as a case study, the lecture will demonstrate current development trends, such as design strategies influenced by physical typologies and public-realm sensitivity.
This lecture will brainstorm key design principles that can be used as future development tools or help elucidate the success of existing properties. A dive into successful international projects as reference models will further the dialogue on criteria for driving a successful destination that rouses locals and tourists’ excitement.
Lecture report
Opening up the current ‘big box’ malls and creating urban villages of mixed uses are some ways of restoring the vibrancy of Orchard Road. This is the future for Singapore’s retail street as envisioned by Mr Phil Kim of architecture and urban planning firm Jerde Partnership.
At his “Reimagining Orchard Road” lecture at CLC on 12 September, the senior vice president highlighted how changes in retail habits and lifestyles have exposed Orchard Road as consisting of 32 malls that offer the same retail services. The key is to break out of this traditional mall format and to create a distinctive district that can attract locals and “pull people from one end to the other”.
“International visitors want to go and hang out where you guys hang out. If you’re not going to Orchard Road very often, it doesn’t have the same kind of authenticity and that’s a tremendous challenge that has to be overcome,” says Mr Kim. He adds that currently, in Orchard Road, “Most locals go to where they want to go, and leave.”
Showcasing Jerde’s approach to large projects such as shopping malls, Mr Kim says his firm creates “urban villages” by focusing on the porosity between different areas and fragmenting the traditional mall formula of an anchor tenant with a line-up of shops. “We’re breaking open the boxes at a more intimate scale, and it’s a much finer-grained look at programming specifics and the different sizes that tenants have,” he explained. Likening this to the retail lanes of Melbourne, Mr Kim said such laneways are successful not just because of their physical dimensions, but their scale breaks the environment to create a more acute and immersive experience.
Beyond enhancing the retail experience of Malls, Orchard Road’s function should also be more than just about retail. A mix of uses should be introduced, including residences and offices, so that people have more reasons to be there. Outdoor features are also needed to bring people out of the buildings.
Source: chensiyuan, Wikicommon: https://bit.ly/2fdWGT4
“You don’t need five lanes on Orchard Road.”
“We want people to engage as part of the city, to create a healthier lifestyle and create moments where you can come in and out of indoor, protected environments,” says Mr Kim. “What that does is it encourages people to come out and use the community parks and amphitheatres as part of a connected experience.”
These principles of neighbourhood-building can be applied even with a shortage of street-level space. “The way things are evolving in terms of our urban projects and urban fabric is from big boxes and traditional mall layouts to streets and laneways. But you can also take that into a vertical format, where we’re pushing out activated programming much higher into the sky than before,” he says.
When asked about the possibility of Orchard Road being pedestrianised, Mr Kim was “agnostic” to the idea but suggested wider transformations with an eye on a coming car-lite future. “I’m more interested in trying to understand the changes to transport and technology. You don’t need five lanes on Orchard Road. You need one, the rest can be carved up, and not necessarily in a linear way, but in a series of areas for gathering, performance events, retail and F&B,” he says.
“The key part is really to think about mixed-use.”
Having this variety of spaces for is crucial for revitalising Orchard Road, says Mr Kim who also predicts a growing demand for people who want to stay in the district be it young creative types or even senior citizens.
Written by Alvin Chua. This report first appeared in the Sep 2017 Better Cities newsletter.
About the Speakers
SPEAKER
Mr Phil Kim
Shareholder & Managing Director, Asia Pacific,
Jerde Partnership;
Trustee, Urban Land Institute Global
Mr Phil Kim focuses on placemaking and advises cities and developers on innovations in mixed-use design, retail, and entertainment, as well as building social sustainability into emerging Asian market conditions. Roppongi Hills in Tokyo and Queens Wharf in Brisbane are representatives of people-based designs under Jerde projects that draw over one billion people annually.
MODERATOR
Mr Michael Koh
Mr Michael Koh has 25 years of experience in the public service including 7 years as CEO of the National Heritage Board and 4 years concurrently as CEO of the National Art Gallery. He was also the former Director of Urban Planning & Design at the Urban Redevelopment Authority where he spearheaded the planning and urban design of the new mixed use Downtown at Marina Bay, revitalisation of Orchard Road as a shopping street and creation of an arts and entertainment district at Bras Basah Bugis.