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Page 1: Turnbull - Phnom Penh

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WWW .ARPLUS.COM MAY 2004 VOLUME CCXV NO 1287

OMA in Berlin (p48} Bucholz McEvoy's Dooradoyle (p58) St Mary Axe, London: Foster & Partners

WORKPLACES

VIEW

27 Young architects in Moscow; high-rise living in Manchester; Patrick Nuttgens obituary

VIEW FROM PHNOM PENH 38 By Robert Turnbull

DESIGN REVIEW

40 Preview of Spectrum 2004: international furniture and interior design show

COMMENT 46 The Office

OFFICE LIVES

48 Dutch embassy, Berlin, Germany OMA

58 Civic offices, Dooradoyle, Ireland BUCHOLZ MCEVOY ARCHITECTS

64 Civic offices, Tubbercurry, Ireland MCCULLOUGH MULVIN ARCHITECTS

68 Offices, Penang, Malaysia KEN YEANG

71 Headquarters building, Tokyo, Japan KEN GO KUMA

PLACE

74 Traumatic transformations in Athens in preparation for the Olympics JIM ANTONIOU

INTERIOR DESIGN

80 Office building, St Mary Axe, City, London FOSTER & PARTNERS/BENNETT INTERIOR DESIGN

HOUSE

86 House, Kyoto, Japan FOBA

PRODUCT REVIEW

91 Milan Furniture Fair

BOOKS

95 Koolhaas's Content; Sydney Opera House; Shigeru Ban; Foster; modern landscape; Roman house

DELIGHT -----98 Villa Lante, Bagnaia, Italy

COVER 48 Dutch embassy. Berlin, Germany OMA Photograph by Christian Richters

Page 2: Turnbull - Phnom Penh

3815

HOtel Le Royal, French Art Deco masterpiece in the Orient opened in 1929, now lavishly restored.

The formerly elegant Cambodian capital

was one of the many victims of the

country's civil wars. It is now at peace,

and attention can finally turn to

restoring its rich architectural heritage.

Tn April 1967, Lee Kwan Yew was invited to

Phnom Penh by Cambodia's Prince Norodom

Sihanouk. Crnising along the capital's elegant

boulevards in his Mercedes convertible, the

Singaporean prcn1ier turned to his host and

mused, 'I hope, one day, my city will look like

this'. Eight years after Lee's visit, Phnom Penh

lay charred and abandoned. Khmer Rouge sol­

diers had dynamited the National Bank and

cathedral. The Art Deco Bibliotheque became

a makeshift kitchen for Chinese advisers to Pol

Pot staying at a decrepit IIotel Le Royal11ext

door. Books were used as firewood. Pigs and

chickens roamed its corridors.

Today Cambodia is finally at peace and

Phnom Penh is undergoing a remarkable trans­

formation. Roads arc being re-paved, colonial

George Gt'Osfier's National Museum completed in 1920 blends Khmer and French themes of the period.

villas rcp~1inted and fount3ins turucd back on

after ~H years . .'\ud, \\·bile belated, the rich

architecturallcgac:' that survived the \Vars is

beginning to attract the attention it dcstTyes, as

well <iS cnn.-.:;idcrabk concern.

At tl1c heart of the tourist agenda is the

Royal l'8lace and the great National Museum

next door, \·vhich houses the best collection of

antiquity frorn Ang"kor's t{~mples outside th{'

l\1usee Guimct in Paris. George Groslier's

1920 masterpiece of Khmer-French architec­

ture boasts a vast angled terraco(ta-colourcd

roof supported by massive teak bcarns. Lo\'ers

or Art Deco can admire HCltel Le Royal, the

nerve centre of\'\ ar correspondents pre-Pol

Pol, since lavishly restored by the Rafllcs hotel

chain. The city's cathedral is lost for ever, but.

along the same quiet tree-lined street where it

once stood are nurnerous handsOinc colonial

editices all harrlly changed in 50 years, along

vvith the raihvay station, the ochre bank and

post office, not to mrution the archives and a

reinvigorated Bibliothcque (sans codwns). For me, however, Phnmn Penh's real archi­

tectural legacy is not colonial but Modernist,

fusing postwar French trends (and a celebra­

tory use of concrete) with the indigenous motifs

of Angkorian antiquity. Called 'New Khmer

Architecture', the unique hybrid flourished

over the decade and a half following the end of

French rule in 1953, but ended abruptly with

the coup that deposed Sihanouk in 1970 and

led ultimately to 30 years of civil war.

The architect responsible for the majority of

these structures is 78-year-old Vann l\1oly­

vann. The first of his countrymen to be trained

in Europe, at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris,

Detail of National Museum roof.

Independence Monument by Vann Molyvann.

he-cam

busier.

Phnom

sen·ice

the tow

vidcd t<

period.

insists,

his ovvr:

Hcv

V\'as to

prince over lC

rencvn

bodia

sirnulta

round' pies a1

Penh.

this ne'

l\lonur

Boulev

the ole

dcveloi

the Ar

structu

by a I" snakes

Ont

formal

slung<

zigzag

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to the!

Railway

. .. endo

Page 3: Turnbull - Phnom Penh

rned back on

cted, the rich

:d the wars is

it deserves, as

.genda -is the

Jnal Museum

1 collection of

:s outside the

ge Groslier's

nch architec­

Hta-coloured

1eams. Lovers

~e Royal, the

lents pre-Pol

: Ra files hotel

c for ever, but

trcet where it

orne colonial

I years, along

ere bank and

rchives and a

Jchons). 1's real an·hi­

ll Modernist,

nd a celebra­

genous motifs

'Ne\v Kluner

id nourished

ing the end of

1bruptly with

'in 1970 ~nd

1e rnajority of Vann Moly­

~ to be trained

Arts in Parjs,

he came directly under the influence ofLc Cor­

busier. Vann Molyvann used the :vfodulor in

Phnom Penh during the 1960s, enlisting the

services of engineer Vladimir Bodiansky and

the town planner Henning, both of whom pro­

vided technical assistance to the UN during the

period. But the essence of his style comes, he

insists, from Angkor \Vat and Khmer antiquity,

his own architectural heritage.

He was to Sihanouk as Christopher Wren

was to Charles II or Shusiev to Stalin. The

prince and his leading architect planned well

over I 00 projects as part of an ambitious urban

renewal programme aimed at dragging Cam­

bodia out of the political backwater, while

simultaneously proclaiming the country's new­

found self-confidence and sovereignty. Exam­

ples are liberally scattered aronnd Phnom

Penh. However, the most obvious symbol of

this new national identity is the Independence

:V1onument that stands defiantly on Norodom

Boulevard, the broad thoroughfare thatjoins

the old colonial section to the modern zone

developed during the '60s. Directly emulating

the Arc de Triomphe, the chocolate-hued

structure is, appropriately enough, surrounded

by a profusion of nagtH, the mythical protective

snakes and kbach. or Khmer ornaments.

On the same street, set back from the road in

formal gardens, is a compound of cooL low­

slung concrete and brick pavilions with quirky

zigzag roof lines. dcvated Angkor \'Vat vvalk­

ways and rhythmical symmetrical doorways

suggestive ofTa Phrom and Preah Khan tem­

ples. Cn·<:itrd as a state p;.-dacc 1 the complex

functions today as the Senate and is acccsslblc

to the public when the government is not in ses-

Railway station, French colonial Classicism ...

... encloses dramatic concrete interior.

Stadium Of national sports complex.

Vann Molyvann's Bassac Theatt<e.

sion. Similarly elegant is the riverside Bassac

Theatre, a brown brick and concrete structure,

with a foyer designed as a series of large trian­

gles suspended above shallow pools of water

and cantilevered staircases. Diamond pat­

terned reel, black and white tiles add splashes of

colour, while louvred ventilation provides light

and air. Sadly, the auditorium was gutted hy

fire in 1994, forcing perforn1ers to rrtove down­

stream to the Chaktomuk Theatre at the point

where the Mekong, Tonie and Bassac rivers

converge. Conceived in 1961 as a Buddhist

conference hall, the fan-shaped building

deploys, once again, triangles and zigzags as

unifying motifs.

The 80 000-seat ='lational Sports Complex,

which opened concurrently with Kenzo

Tange:s more famous stadiun1 in Tokyo in

1966, is perhaps the strongest statement about

friendship between nations and hosted the

Asian Games or the same year. Besides the

four vast concrf'tt towers, the stadiurn has a

stunning cantilevered roof and large ornamen­

tal pools that directly imitate the bamvc~, or tra­

ditional reservoirs of Angkor \'Vat. i\lore

allusions to Khmer antiquitv can be found at

the School of Forci?;n Languages on Pochen­

toug Boulevard, vvht-re another n.oga-protcctrd

walk.,.vay leads the \'isitors over bauyj of\\ ater.

To one side is a tinv circular library of ribbed

concrete.

Vann ~luly\aral rect'ntly became the subjt-ct

of a rnajor study, Bui/dinx Cambodw: .'\"{;:, !thmer

.-bdutecturFJ953-J:J7fJ, by ARK (Architectural

IZt'st·arch Khrnrr;, <-1 group cnmp1 is in,~ archi­

tect H()k SukoL dll historian Darn·! ( :otlins

~1nd the an hitcef-tJrh;nJi.sr Hdcn ( ~r;tn! Ro::.~

Lu Ban Hap's Chenla Theatt'e.

Circular ribbed library of Foreign languages School.

Due to be published this year, one of its airns is

the creation of an inventory of all Cambodian

architecture from the period. Vann 1\!lolyvann,

Collins asserts, was not alone but merely the

greatest and most prolific of a group of archi­

tects working in his employ, most of whom died

during the civil wars. A good example is per­

haps the Chenla, Lu Ban Hap's eccelltric,

abstract theatre where Sihanouk hosted his so­

called international film festivals.

But ARK has major concerns, the main one

being that Cambodian architectural students

have little knmvledge of the creative flowering

following independenu·. (Ironically, when so

much of modern Cambodian identity is sub­

sumed by the overwhelming power of Angkor

and the Angkorian empire on the national psy­

che.) As a result, neglect, botched restorations

and inadvertent destruction are still serious

threats to the survival of twentieth-century

huildlngs. lvlany renovations are neither up to

standard nor conducted transpucntly. The

Bassac Theatre remains in a state of suspended

animation, while officials at the Ministry of

Culture fight ovc-r the rnoney needed to restore

it. The Chenla has been annexed by an ugly,

circular restaurant. The restoration of the

Sports Complex was handed over to a Tai­

wanese cornpany so that the perimeter could

be developed with commercial outlets. Results

were poor and served only to suffocate this

ClriCC imposing!;.' \'olumlnous space. ::\'lore

responsive and inwginati\·e approaches arc

greatly needed, so that this distinctive period of

Indo-Chintsc 1\:fndcrni;-;m can be truly appreci­

ated once IHOIT. ROBERTTURNBCLI.

391