Sydney train stations

Hey peeps! Of course I am aware I haven’t updated for awhile now. Just a little pre-occupied with uni, as usual. Well after an incredible series of misfortunes in the past weeks, I’ve finally got myself (pretty much) back on track and I’m now passionately working on the West Metro Design Studio with the MUDD students in uni.

So I am sure some of you will not be too surprised to know that THIS is one of my recent interests:

TRAINS! Woooot~

Well I’ve got more work waiting so I’ve really gotta run soon. But for now, here are some photos of a few of the train stations (a little off the Sydney CBD) I’ve visited recently… The photos were taken collectively in the past month, so yeah, they’re quite up-to-date.

Parramatta Station

The Parramatta Station by Hassell, linked to the retail giant Westfield. My group’s currently working on revitalising the Parramatta CBD with a rail proposal for the city for the West Metro Design Studio. A lot of fun

St Leonards Station

I guess this project’s not as new as the rest, but here’s a photo anyway. The Forum Development by PTW creates a pleasant place for the community which lives/works there. Notice the Dubai-esque theme (with the palm trees and water feature) going on in the courtyard there..

Chatswood Station

New exciting interchange project, at the Chatswood Station by Cox, still under construction.

Can’t wait to see the development of these future retail areas (on the left). It will be interesting to see how shopping activities can feed in to the station’s livelihood when it’s all done, or vice versa. Btw more of the Dubai-esque trees here…

Milsons Point Station

Good ol’ Milsons Point Station, simply blessed by fantastic views of Sydney Harbour Just a stone’s throw from the ferry services.

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Alright that’s all for now guys, will try to update more often! Ciao.

Dateline urbanism

Like all other hosts, Beijing became a gigantic stage on Friday — a spectacle for one of the most celebrated triumphs of humanity, the Olympic Games. There has been a high-profile race, a rush, in the urban development of Beijing: “the auspicious 08/08/08″ became the dateline for the completion of new spectacular architectural icons, the subway system, and even for the urban experiment to clear up the hazy Beijing skies.

And it was indeed exciting, with all these developments as the backdrop for the fireworks on the opening night. How could it not be?! These are the projects that flanked the spreads of archimags over and over and over again in the past year. This dateline saw every inch of Herzog de Meuron’s Birds’ Nest finally complete and fully manipulated for show effects; the Water Cube grandly, but unfortunately not-so-tastefully, lit during the Opening Ceremony; OMA’s CCTV glass facade finally complete…

The GoogleMaps have been updated, go play with it!

View Larger Map

What’s next? Sure the event has changed the face of Beijing forever. The buildings look great on TV, and perhaps even on GoogleEarth. But what will happen after the Games? How can these developments contribute to the city and the country after the Olympic traffic is gone?

Preparations for the Olympic Games in Sydney eight years ago created a whole new suburb, major sports village with sports/expo facilities, and upgraded the city centre as well as many tourist sites. The main Olympic site — Homebush Bay — which once attracted hundreds of thousands of people during the Games, now falls short in its integration with the daily urban life of Sydneysiders.

It will definitely be interesting to see the post-Olympic effects of the Beijing sites in five to ten years time.

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P/s: Oh, the new Google Street View is worth trying out too!

Olympic fever

Oh yeah!!!

The dateline for the Beijing mega-projects is finally up. It is pretty hard to find time to update LBA when I am already struggling to catch up with the Games and assignments at the same time

Oh well, here’s a cute Coca-cola advert of the Bird’s Nest. These little creatures might just put Herzog de Meuron out of business, hehehe, enjoy!

Midweek walk

One of the things I really miss, every time I go back to KL, is walking.

Back home, nobody really walks. The longest walk most Malaysians take (on a daily basis) is possibly from their front door to the car, then from the car to the lift lobby, and then to their office desks. Vice versa. Anything that requires more walking, like shopping, is considered additional exercise.

I don’t know, perhaps this could be changing now with the fuel prices jacked up… But even so, KL doesn’t offer a very pleasant walking experience — the city was never really designed for pedestrians. Oh well!

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So I was taking a walk around Circular Quay and came across Caritas’ presentation for Blueprint for a Better World: The Millennium Development Goals and You in Customs House, possibly in conjunction with the World Youth Day.

Oh btw while many of my Malaysian and Singaporean friends came to Sydney for the WYD, I – being extremely sick of crowds (the crowd was crazy, or so I heard) – cleverly avoided every bit of it when I was back in KL. Muahahahaha!

People left little notes, joining the effort by making personal pledges towards a better world…

Some of these are actually mind-provoking and quite interesting to read, especially those by kids

Kids, nowadays… are becoming pretty much like mini-adults, just ALOT MORE creative.

Back to uni

Apologies.

Have been back in Sydney for almost a week now… simply couldn’t find the time to update.

The two weeks spent back home in KL was mostly spent in traffic jams, in shopping malls (It is the Malaysian Mega Sales till Sept 1st btw), and of course, EATING.

It was really good, finally spending some time with my family. (Please check later for photo updates) Missing all of them already

Thanks for the great time, and for being there for me all the time. You guys know who you are!

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There was hardly enough time for me to catch up on the sleep I’ve been missing the past session. But here it is again: Time to get back to uni. It’s always weird, that never-ending loop — the architorturous yet enjoyable loop.

Oh well, a little too busy to blog right now. More entries after confirming on the courses I’ve enrolled in this session.  So till then, ciao!

P/s:
Oh btw, my blog is now accessible from http://blog.liveebyarchitecture.com/ Weeeeeeeeee~! My online portfolio is, errrr, still under construction. Will work on it, will work on it…

Updates

Sorry about my inactivity in LBA.

I’m home in Malaysia, the land of good food and interiorized urbanism:P

Updates later.

Apple Store, Sydney

Hi guys, I guess it was about time the Evil White Fruit came to town!

The Archinerd and I went to pay that giant fruit a visit last week. We actually intended to go on the night the Sydney Apple store was launched but I was pretty sure every single Sydneysider you know was in the darn queue so we ended up watching SATC instead.

The structural glass facade that almost puts others of its kind in the CBD to shame. Seriously! Muahahaha..

And definitely one of Sydney’s coolest staircases with equally cool lighting.

I guess this is what my staircase-fetish does to me!

Oh dear! I am sooo going back to get my IPod case. I don’t know about you but I certainly have a serious love-hate relationship with Apple!

Sorry I really had to do this — it was too irresistable! Har har har…

Alright peeps, ciao for now!

Adaptive Reuse Studio – Final presentation pt2

This is how the model was transported to the uni, since you were all so curious!

But of course, you’d probably also need an Archinerd who is willing to wake up early in the morning to help you carry the models and boards to the uni before leaving to work…

Oh, and I also really need to thank dearest Vivien. She cut her finger while helping me trim the edges off my presentation boards the night before!

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Just another photo: Our 1:500 site model of the Walsh Bay Wharves, Sydney Harbour. It was a joint effort by all of us in the Adaptive Reuse Studio.

I’m just feeding you with images first — still very, very busy with uni. Ciao!

The final weeks

Been busy with the Adaptive Reuse Studio for Pier 2/3, Walsh Bay Wharves.

We finally had our Week 12 Pre-final Presentation yesterday.

The journey so far.

Structural concept model, still under construction.

Final presentation’s in 2 weeks… Wish me luck!

Cardboard architecture

Hi guys! Am still in a serious Archistress mode but was surfing the net while having lunch just now. Came across Paper tea house by Shigeru Ban, reliving many many memories from my Taylor’s Architorture days back home in Malaysia.

Paper tea house by Shigeru Ban
(Image credits: Icon Eye)

See more images and description on Icon Eye, here.

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It strikes a chord in my Taylor’s-days memories. In my very first design studio ever, my class had a similar project which required us to design and build a life-size architectural folly made of corrugated cardboard.

With the Archinewbie enthusiasm and naivety, my group mate and I experimented with different joints to put these flimsy recycled cardboards together. I can still remember how accomplished we felt at the end of the task.

So I decided to dig out these old sketches.

Busy as I am now, it still feels good to slow down and look back at how I entered Architorture with no idea of the sleepless nights that will come. The naivety back then. The stuff that I sketched (I don’t think I even draw like that anymore! Har har har). The many painful cuts Nads and I had during model-making. The progress I’ve made so far. And the great friendships I’ve found along the way.

And this group mate of mine, Kwok Keong, has grown to be one of my very good friends today

Oh dear, I really miss the good old Taylor’s days.

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P/s: Oh Nads, and I will never forget your group’s work too! Because it was utterly ‘contaminated’ by your beloved group mate, our beloved Melvin! Muahahaha.

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UPDATE: The then-Melvin is now better known as Jit. He is apparently very particular about this and so I guess you guys should all know him as Jit. But what the heck, you’ll forever be my beloved Melvin! Don’t expect anything to change!