From Character and Visual Identity to Theme—Gardens: Design of Parks and Public Open Space in Postmodern Singapore

Abstract

Following a postmodern trend, planners attempted to address the social and cultural challenges posed by the rapid and extensive post-war urban growth, by advocating a revival of contextualism and regionalism, as well as the use of vernacular and popular culture icons in urban design. Singapore’s parks and gardens were conceptualized as an island-wide ‘cultural system’ meant to construct place identity and ‘imageability’ in support of the larger picture of nation building realized through the welfare-state public housing policy. Parks’ design was thematized to reflect in various manner the state’s ‘multicultural theme’, used to redirect tourism marketing strategies and the sociopolitical constructions of an ‘imagined community’.