today i took a bus to jalan ampas in balestier to take a look at the old shaw movie-making studio that is still standing to see if i could use it for a site but the context is so weird. balestier itself is such a weird mish mash of typologies. the site was boarded up but i could peek through the gate into the yard and i think i saw giant wooden film reels lying in a corner and a retro 'silence' sign over a door. i think if this facility was sited somewhere more accessible it would be a good place to restore for the local film community. however the context, as i said, is really weird. the studio is located in a hive of condominiums on one side and an odd temple on the other and flatted factories on the opposite side of the road and once you walk out of jalan ampas to balestier road it's a series of mixed-use buildings lining the roads alongside shophouses of food and mostly housing construction material shops. i think i won't have dared to peer through the gate at night though. reading all the stories of the glorious cinema age of the 1950s recently would have made it quite scary, like the place wasn't touched since then.

anyway neither frank gehry nor michael grave's proposals on sentosa excite me. they seem formularic. i'm a bit apprehensive about what some starchitects are doing to our island! for one i think the cathy restoration was flat and blandly commercialised. check out the cathy gallery on the second floor though, the small exhibit is quite interesting.

to me: dig deeper!