SINGAPORE – Block 1 East Coast Road is a squat, five-storey HDB block on the corner of East Coast Road and Siglap Road that does not particularly stand out.
Yet after The Straits Times reported on Oct 5 that the authorities would repurpose the 61-year-old building, reversing an earlier decision to demolish it and redevelop the site, netizens gushed about the news.
On social media, netizens called Block 1 and the cluster of flats around it their “childhood place” and a beloved landmark in Siglap from decades gone by.
To many of these people, the building was a reminder of yesteryear, the kind that seems to be increasingly rare in Singapore these days. Their reactions also showed that everyday, mundane buildings can have significant heritage value.
Built in 1963 on the site of a kampung that had been destroyed by a fire, Blocks 1 to 4 East Coast Road were among the earliest flats delivered by the then nascent Housing Board.
While they have been vacant since 2015, in the 52 years that those flats were in use, they were the only public housing in Siglap, an enclave of private homes.
They have also been a constant in a neighbourhood that has lost other landmarks such as the old Siglap Market.
Previously, all four blocks were slated for demolition under a Selective En bloc Redevelopment Scheme (Sers) project announced in 2011. Now, Block 1 will be retained for public use after the authorities put out a tender for consultants to oversee the building’s refurbishment, while its three neighbouring blocks will be torn down by 2026.
Observers have described the buildings as “architecturally unremarkable” and not the kind to be admired, but the recent public reaction is evidence that even the most nondescript buildings can be treasured by the communities that lived, worked and grew up around them.
Architectural photographer Darren Soh said the built environment “does not only consist of heroic and iconic structures” like those in the Central Business District, pointing out that ordinary spaces and buildings also contribute to the lived experiences and memories of Singaporeans.
“MRT stations, bus interchanges, town and neighbourhood centres and other HDB blocks could all be important to different people, depending on who you ask,” said Mr Soh.
He added that these buildings “also bear the architectural time stamp of their era, and some may become unique or rare”, as other buildings of their vintage are torn down and redeveloped.