Dense and green building typologies: Architecture as urban ecosystem

Abstract

Contemporary architecture and urban design practice in Singapore is increasingly exploring the integration of green spaces in buildings, producing new typologies for high-density environments that include public spaces, extensive sky terraces, sky bridges, vertical parks, roof gardens and other ‘green’ components. Combinations of all these, often applied to mixes of residential, civic and commercial programmes, conjoin at times to produce ‘vertical cities’ in which the building section becomes part of larger urban ecosystems such as parks, gardens and river networks. Density and sustainability here are not seen as contradictory but rather as mutually dependent and synergistic.