Tong Tong Friendship Store
This rosy-tinted curved wall swirls through the shop, serves as an intricate backdrop to display the dresses, and like a coquettish woman who coyly reveals and seduces, beckons the visitor into an exquisite tea room at the end of the shop.
It’s perhaps second nature that as architects we pay attention to what we wear; fashion and architecture share close bonds – the texture of materials, colors, structure, geometry, crafting and the perfect ‘fit’. The Tong Tong Friendship Store is a quaint little shop selling quirky and cheekily reinvented traditional Chinese-inspired dresses and clothes designed by Tan Sheau Yun.
The site and surrounding context provide challenges and direction to the design. Tucked in a corner of the mall, it clearly needs attention. But also, we wanted to create an intimate ambience within the shop – an inner sanctum that is shielded from the public thoroughfare.
The site and surrounding context provide challenges and direction to the design. Tucked in a corner of the mall, it clearly needs attention. But also, we wanted to create an intimate ambience within the shop – an inner sanctum that is shielded from the public thoroughfare.
Our main design gesture is simple and achieves these aims. Alluding to the Tong Tong’s design philosophy of reinvention of the old, we designed a sinuous curved wall using concrete ventilation blocks commonly found in our old local shophouse. This rosy-tinted curved wall swirls through the shop, serves as an intricate backdrop to display the dresses, and like a coquettish woman who coyly reveals and seduces, beckons the visitor into an exquisite tea room at the end of the shop. From here the visitor can rest her weary feet, sip a warm cup of tea, and "be friends with chinese culture".
LOCATION
Singapore
YEAR
Completion 2008
DISCIPLINE
INTERIOR
TYPOLOGY
RETAIL/COMMERCIAL
SIZE (SQM)
50
TEAM
Peter Sim, Torrance Goh, Hong Weiming
COLLABORATORS
Photographer: Jeremy San Tzer Ning
