Unmasking the city hall facade a study of its visuality in images 22

CHAPTER 2

Masquerades:
Deceptive Appearances


2.1

Signpost


2.1.1

The Façade as Icon


At a meeting of the Municipal Commissioners held in 1920, commissioner G.R.K.
Mugliston proposed an ambitious scheme for the construction of a civic centre
surrounding the Padang, a flat green field that marked the heart of official Singapore.1
Large, colored plans presented to the members illustrated a series of impressive
buildings occupying the entire vicinity surrounding the Padang. The proposed civic
centre comprised of municipal buildings, law courts, and government offices around
the Padang.2 As the area was already the centre of the civic district, Mugliston’s
scheme was in fact a proposal for re-construction. To him, the scheme was essential,
as “The centre of official Singapore has been looking distinctly dingy for some time
past.”3 As the capital of the Straits Settlements, Singapore was one of the most
dynamic commercial centers of the British Empire.4 Due to the island’s geographical
location, it was a major entrepôt on the East-West mercantile route, and the trading
centre of the Netherlands East Indies and the Malay Peninsula.5 Thus,
…nothing but the best is good enough for Singapore. Through its wonderful position
it became the leading port of the world years ago and its future growth may be

anything. There is no room for timid ideas in planning the development of such a city
as this.6

To be erected in the neo-classical style, the buildings that made up the civic centre
were envisioned to be bold, impressive, and magnificent.7 Most importantly, the
facades of the building, which extended from the Fullerton Building to the port, had
to be monumental.8 For the continuous façade, located next to the Johnston Pier, was

1

“Municipal Commission: Ambitious Scheme for a Civic Centre”, in The Straits Times, 30 October 1920, p.9.
ibid.
3
“New Municipal Building”, in The Straits Times, 30 April 1929, p.10
4
C.M. Turnbull. A History of Modern Singapore 1819-2005 (Singapore: NUS Press, c2009), p.93.
5
ibid.
6
“A Civic Centre”, in The Straits Times, 30 October 1920, p.8
7
ibid.
8
ibid.
2

25


the view that greets all arriving by sea to the island.9 The continuous, monumental

façade was to convey, in visual terms, the image of Singapore as a prosperous trade
centre. It was a communicative device, or a signpost that announced to visitors their
arrival at the capital of the British Straits Settlement. The façade’s visuality was thus
of the utmost importance – it had to stake out the territory as a Crown colony at a
glance.

The ambitious scheme to reconstruct the civic centre was forwarded in the midst of
favorable economic conditions in the aftermath of World War II.10 Trade was
flourishing due to the post-war boom, the British Empire had recovered from the
consequences of the war, and the effects of the economic recession that was to
approach at the end of 1920 had not yet been felt.11 Sentiments were optimistic, and
the reconstruction of the civic center was deemed a necessity. In the scheme proposed
by Mugliston, the construction of a building housing the municipal offices was to be
the first in a series of monumental architecture that would make up the civic centre.12
Depending on the availability of funds, the reconstruction of the civic centre was to be
conceived in several phases over the years.13 The housing of the Singapore
municipality, however, was forwarded as a task of “great urgency and real
necessity.”14

9

Buildings around the civic centre were often featured in the views of Singapore from the sea. See Gretchen Liu.
Singapore: A Pictorial History 1819-2000. London: Curzon, 2001.
10
C.M. Turnbull. A History of Modern Singapore 1819-2005, p.139.
11
ibid.
12
“Municipal Commission: Ambitious Scheme for a Civic Centre”, in The Straits Times, 30 October 1920, p.9.
13

ibid.
14
ibid.

26


The Singapore municipality came into existence in 1856, during the regime of the
East India Company.15 Due to the rapid growth of the city, the municipality expanded
swiftly in the following years. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the
municipality comprised of the president, the secretariat, and the commissioners, as
well as various bureaus such as the Health Department and the Municipal Engineer’s
Department.16 First housed in the Town Hall (later known as the Victoria Memorial
Hall) when it was completed in 1862, the municipality shifted to a larger building in
Finlayson Green in 1893.17 By 1920, the municipality was housed in different
buildings scattered around various parts of the town.18 The rebuilding of an office to
accommodate the expansion of the municipality was proposed as early as 1913, but
no concrete plans were conceived.19 In an official survey done by the municipal
architect S.D. Meadows, the “badly-housed staff” located in disparate offices led to an
inefficient administration, which resulted in a wastage of both time and money.20 The
construction of a new building to centralise the municipal administration thus took
priority amongst the various governmental institutions that were to be housed in the
redevelopment of the civic center.21

At the meeting, Mugliston’s proposal for the redevelopment of the civic center and
the erection of a new building to house the municipal offices was immediately
approved by the president, J.R.R. Farrer.22 On the same day, Farrer set up a
committee to study and report on the plans for the design and construction of the new

15

“New Municipal Building”, in The Straits Times, 30 April 1929, p.10.
ibid.
17
ibid.
18
“The New Town Hall”, in The Straits Times, 10 January 1925, p.9.
19
“Municipal Offices”, in The Straits Times, 18 July 1923, p.8
20
“Proposed Municipal Offices, Singapore”, in The Straits Times, 25 July 1923, p.9.
21
“Municipal Commission: Ambitious Scheme for a Civic Centre”, in The Straits Times, 30 October 1920, p.9.
22
ibid.
16

27


municipal building.23 Its architecture was chiefly conceived through a series of
meetings between the committee and the municipal architect, F.D. Meadows, in the
years spanning1920-25.24 The final plans of the building were drawn up by another
municipal architect, A. Gordon, who oversaw the construction of the building from
1926 to its completion in 1929.25

With a frontage of 370 feet, the façade of the Municipal Building was the longest in
Singapore at the time of its conception.26 In a report by the committee submitted in
1924, the visuality of the Municipal Building façade emerged as the most debated part
of the design.27 In order to signpost Singapore as a prosperous British colony, the

objective guiding the façade’s design was the “need for (visual) effect”, or the
exudation of monumentality. This was to be achieved through the employment of the
neoclassical architecture style. An initial design of the façade submitted by Meadows
to the committee was rejected. He was then requested to produce an additional seven
alternative design proposals, each illustrating a different architectural treatment of the
façade. The final design of the façade was chosen due to the visual continuity of its
architectural elements. The committee forwarded: “in our opinion, the unbroken front
shown in this scheme is an important and pleasing feature of the design.” All the other
design proposals of the façade included the insertion of a porch at the entrance of the
building as a provision for wet weather conditions, which the committee deemed to
interfere with its perception as a visual whole. The placement of a porch at the
23

ibid.
S. Douglas Meadows. “Report on Proposed New Municipal Offices for the Municipal Commissioners of
Singapore”, in Administrative Report of the Singapore Municipality for 1924 (Singapore: The Straits Times Press
Limited, 1925), pp.1-15. Many thanks to Assistant Professor Jiat-Hwee Chang at the National University of
Singapore for referring me to this article.
25
“Notes of the Day”, in The Straits Times, 7 January 1935, p.10.
26
“New Municipal Building,” in The Straits Times, 30 April 1929, p.10.
27
“Municipal Building. Report of the Special Committee”, in The Straits Times, 29 July 1924, p.11. All
subsequent information on the report of the design of the Municipal Building by the committee and architect are
drawn from this source, unless footnoted otherwise.
24

28

symmetrical centre of the façade was thought to “detract from the general appearance
of the building” by effecting a break between the flight of steps leading up to the main
entrance and the Corinthian columns.

The emphasis on the visual monumentality of the façade in its design conception can
be discerned from its disciplined geometrical forms. Located at the symmetrical
center of the façade is a wide flight of steps that leads to a podium (Figure 2). From
there, a series of Corinthian columns rise three-storey high. Colossal in size, the scale
of the Corinthian columns defines the imposing nature of the façade. In view of this,
the placement of a porch, a horizontal element that cuts across the vertical ascendance
of the columns would hinder the visual perception of the façade as a unified whole,
thus reducing its spectacularity of scale. However, the elimination of the porch meant
that the main entrance could not be used in wet weather conditions. Instead, the
building would have to be accessed from an alternative entrance constructed beneath
the flight of steps in those instances. The design conception of the façade was thus an
exercise that prioritised visual effect over use, or function.

The prolonged discussion and deliberation over the visuality of the façade was in
stark contrast to the swift decisions made over the design of the building’s rear
elevation and its interiority. While the visuality of the façade subsumed function in
the pursuit for a monumental “effect,” utility was the main objective guiding the
design of the interiors. The interiors were described as: “[on] a whole plain and
utilitarian”.28 The plans of the interiors were developed after close consultation with
the various departments of the municipality in order to understand their needs, with
28

“New Municipal Building”, in The Straits Times, 30 April 1929, p.10. All subsequent write-up on the design of
the interiors of the Municipal Building are drawn from this source, unless footnoted otherwise.

29


“comfort and convenience” being the chief concern in the design process.29 Stark,
simple and minimal, furniture were arranged to maximise the use of space in
accommodating the staff. Floors were rubber tiled and cornices were eliminated in
order “to make cleaning as convenient as it is in a hospital”.

In the design of the rear elevation, it was deemed, like the interiors, to have “no need
for [visual] effect”. Unlike the façade, the rear elevation did not face any public roads.
Hence, this elevation, like the interior of the building, was to be “of the simplest
construction and design, the idea here being strictly utilitarian”. The dichotomy
between the spectacular façade and utilitarian nature of the architectural body boiled
down to the issue of public visibility, or the use of the façade as a visual gestalt to
signpost the colony.

Significantly, the façade was entirely illustrated and discussed as an image. No issues
were raised regarding the nature of the façade as an interface between interior and
exterior spaces. Nor was it conceived as an experiential space that formed part of the
architectural approach. By conceiving the façade as a two-dimensional drawing, the
surface of the building becomes equivalent to that of the drawing board. The façade
was conceived essentially as an image. Unsurprisingly, the final design of the façade
was selected based on the architectural images, or orthographic drawings produced by

29

The design of the Board Room, now known as the City Hall Chambers, was an exception that was not in
keeping with the utilitarian nature of the City Hall’s interiors. As the setting to various municipal events such as
annual and regular commissioner’s meetings for which reporters were invited, it needed to be “truly worthy of
civic Singapore.” (“Untitled,” in The Straits Times, 21 February 1931, p.10.) Situated in the centre block of the

building, the room was in actual fact a hall of great proportions rising two storeys in height. Flanked on its sides by
massive columns cladded in Siena marble with bronze bases, two great chandeliers designate the centre of the hall,
marking the spot where the commissioners sat around a semi-circular table during municipal meetings. At the head
of the table was a raised dais, conceived specially for the president of the municipality. The opulence and luxury of
the Board Room, like the façade, can be attributed to its public interface, which required it to adopt a prominent
visuality.

30


Meadows. Commenting on the use of drawings in the conception of architecture, Stan
Allen posits that:
The work of representation could therefore be understood as a series of provisional
strategies – necessarily abstract and intangible – to negotiate difference and work
within the gap between vision and visuality.30

For Allen, the “work of representation” refers to orthographic and perspectival
drawings, which are used to mediate the “gap between vision and visuality.” As a
physiological process, vision refers to the physical operation in which light falls on
the retinas of the eyes to create a visual image of the world.31 Visuality, on the other
hand, is a social process through which the knowledge and interests of the viewers, as
well as the intentions and desires of the producers of visual image, inform the act of
seeing.32 Visuality, or the culture of perception, is vision socialised. The architectural
drawing thus serves to mediate between vision and visuality. In his writings, Allen is
chiefly concerned with the social construction of the visual field, or the mediation of
vision through orthographic and perspectival construction.

What the committee was interested in, however, was the visual construction of the
social field, or the use of the architectural design of the façade to signpost Singapore
as a British colony. But more than a signpost that staked out Singapore as a colony,

embodied within the geometrical forms of the façade was the British’s social and
cultural conception of the colony. The façade was not just any image. It was an icon
that made visible the British conception of Singapore. Its visuality gave material form
to the abstract idea of colonisation, or the British imagination of Singapore as a
30

Stan Allen. Practice: Architecture, Technique and Representation (Australia: GB Arts International, 2000),
p.12.
31
John A. Walker and Sarah Chaplin. Visual Culture: An Introduction (Manchester: Manchester University Press,
1997), p.22.
32
Mieke Bal. “Visual Essentialism and the Object of Visual Culture,” in Journal of Visual Culture Vol. 2:1
(2003), p.24.

31


colony. As a visual gestalt that was put on full view for all to see, what then, how was
Singapore conceived through the visuality of the façade?

32


2.1.2

Imagining the Colony


The face of Singapore must change much in the future, owing to the

increasing importance of the City.33

At the commissioner’s meeting, Mugliston forwarded that the construction of a
magnificent, continuous façade that spanned from the Fullerton Building to the port
was to be the new “face of Singapore.” And the imaging of the Municipal Building
façade, as part of the re-construction of the civic centre, represented this new ‘face’.

Commenting on the role of the façade as face, Colin Rowe posits that the “…face [is],
the metaphorical plan of intersection between the eyes of the observer and what one
may dare to call the soul of the building…”34 For Rowe, the face is a communicative
device between the self and other. It is conceived as a reflection of the inner self,
endowed with the power to convey various aspects, if not the truth of, one’s soul. In
this, the face functions in a similar trajectory as the icon. Like the icon, which
operates as a window through which an abstract idea is made visible and imaginable,
the face functions as a portal to the soul, however intangible the latter may seem.
Crucially, Rowe’s conception of the face as a window to the soul draws from the field
of physiognomy. Physiognomy deems facial features as being capable of indicating
the hidden character and emotional qualities of a subject.35 Exteriority, or facial forms
and features, is regarded as a direct manifestation of interiority. For Rowe, the soul of

33

G.R.K. Mugliston, quoted from “Municipal Commission: Ambitious Scheme for a Civic Centre,” in The Straits
Times, 30 October 1920, p.9. Italics are mine.
34
Colin Rowe. “James Stirling: A Highly Personal and Very Disjointed Memoir”, in Peter Arnell and Ted
Bickford (eds.), James Stirling: Buildings and Projects (New York: Rizzoli Publications, 1984), p.22. Emphasis is
from original text.
35
A discipline that reached the peak of its influence in the 1840s, physiognomy faded into oblivion in the early

twentieth century after being repudiated as a pseudoscience. Robert A. Sobieszek. Ghost in a Shell: Photography
and the Human Soul (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1999), p.17.

34


a building is its “condition of ‘internal’ animation.”36 The façade of a building is thus
representative of the activities taking place within, or its function.

Similarly for Le Corbusier, the façade, or the “surface,” is conceived as an expression
of the building’s function, for:
A mass is enveloped in its surface, a surface which is divided up according to the
directing and generating lines of the mass; and this gives the mass its individuality…
Surfaces, pitted by holes in accordance with the necessities of their destined use,
should borrow the generating and accusing lines of these simple forms.37

The “mass” which Le Corbusier refers to is the architectural body. To Le Corbusier,
the surface is to be “divided up according to the directing and generating lines of the
mass,” in order to project the identity of the building. Like Rowe, Le Corbusier
regards the façade as an expression of the building’s function. The surface “borrow[s]
the generating and accusing lines” of the mass to reflect the “necessities of their
destined use,” or the building’s function. However, by using the term “surface”
instead of “face”, Le Corbusier recognises that there are instances in which the façade
functions as a superficial exteriority that does not always reflect its interior. For his
treatise was written in response to the “contradiction of intention” between the surface
and the mass, or when a disjuncture occurs between the façade and the function
within.38

In the imaging of the Municipal Building façade, it is deemed not just as the ‘face’ of
the building, but also that of Singapore. The façade thus acquires an expanded

interiority that encompasses the entire colony. As the ‘face’ of Singapore, the
36

Colin Rowe. “James Stirling: A Highly Personal and Very Disjointed Memoir”, p.10.
Le Corbusier. Towards a New Architecture (London: Architectural Press, 1946), pp.36&41.
38
ibid, p.41.
37

35


visuality of the Municipal Building façade goes beyond representing the institutional
function of the building as an administrative center for the British colonials. It is an
icon that is used to give material form to the idea of the British colonial enterprise.
Conceived as ‘face’ instead of ‘surface,’ its architectural forms are regarded as a
truthful reflection of the British endeavor in Singapore. And in order to uncover the
meaning, or the conception of the colonial enterprise behind the façade’s visuality, the
iconological approach is adopted. Conceived in 1939 chiefly for the analysis of
Renaissance artworks, Erwin Panosky’s iconological scheme emphasises the use of
literary sources to decipher the themes and concepts expressed by objects and events
depicted in images.39 Due to the nature of artworks produced during the Renaissance,
which were often commissioned to depict theological themes, Panofsky posits a oneto-one iconographic correspondence between a classical text and an image. Taking
into account the Municipal Building’s façade, which was commissioned out of the
political desire to stake Singapore out as a Crown colony, there is a need to examine
social, cultural and historical discourse in order to understand the visuality of the
Municipal Building façade. In this, a one-to-one correspondence between image and
text as advocated by Panofsky is no longer assumed.

As the capital of the Straits Settlement, Singapore was a satellite within the network

of colonies governed by the British Empire. The British Empire was imagined as a
singular entity with a shared identity, much like the notion of the nation today.
Following the work of Ernest Gellner and Benedict Anderson, nations are regarded as

39

Erwin Panofsky. Meaning in the Visual Arts (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), pp.26-54. The
following write-up on iconology is referenced from this source.

36


socially constructed entities, which are in part imagined communities.40 The nation is
no longer a geopolitical entity with a clearly delimited territory that is legitimated by
the apparatus of the state and the government. It is also a culturally imagined
construct which depends to a certain extent on invented traditions, manufactured
myths, and a shared perception of social order.41 The British Empire was not just a
geopolitical entity, but also a culturally created and imaginatively constructed
artifact.42 For the British regarded their empire as “one vast, interconnected world,”
which spanned from the heart in London, to the most remote corners of the tropics.43

For Anderson, the nation as an imagined community was only made possible by the
advent of print capitalism.44 Significantly, he posits that the circulation of written
works created the “image of… communion,” through which the abstract concept of
the nation became imaginable. It is through the culturally constructed image that the
intangible is concretized, thus enabling the imagination of the nation. Elaborating on
the relationship between image and the mind, Italo Calvino describes the imagination
as a “mental cinema…projecting images before our mind’s eye.”45 To Calvino, the
imagination functions like a cinematic apparatus. And the mind is the screen on which
images are projected in order to make manifest ideas and concepts.46 Except for the

40

Ernest Gellner. “Nations and Nationalism” in Vincent P. Pecora (ed.). Nations and Identities: Classic Readings
(Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2001), pp.292-307; Benedict Anderson. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the
Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991), pp.1-7.
41
Eric Hobsbawn and Terence Ranger (eds.). The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1983), p.1.
42
Jack Cannadine. Ornamentalism: How the British Saw their Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001),
p.4.
43
ibid.
44
Benedict Anderson. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London:
Verso, 1991), pp.37-46. The following write up on the conception of the nation as an imagined community is
referenced from this source.
45
Italo Calvino. Six Memos for the Next Millennium (Cambridge: Havard University Press, 1988), p.83
46
One may wonder about the origin of the repository of images in the imagination. While the boundary between
images of the mind, or mental images, and images of everyday life, or physical images, have been much debated,
Ludwig Wittgenstein has argued that: “…we could perfectly well…replace every process of imagining by a
process of looking at an object or any painting, drawing, or modeling…” For Wittgenstein, both mental and
physical images belong to the same category of objects with identical properties that are interchangeable with each
other: “[mental images] should not be thought of as private, metaphysical, immaterial entities anymore than real

37

literary nature of the works, Anderson’s “image of communion” converges with the
function of the icon, in making the abstract and intangible imaginable. While
Anderson’s image, derived from written works, is verbal in nature, the study posits
that pictorial images function similarly in concretising abstract notions to make them
imaginable to the mind.47

And one of the ways in which the empire was made visible was by its dissemination
through a host of images.48 As a means of connecting the peripheral territories to the
centre in London, images were manifested and circulated through various objects and
events. These ranged from paraphernalia such as postcards and matchboxes, to
imperial ceremonies and processions. The imaging of architecture also emerged as a
crucial way in which the empire was culturally and imaginatively constructed to relate
the colonies to the heart of the empire. As an icon, the visuality of the Municipal
Building façade was a reflection of the ways in which the British understood,
visualised, and imagined the colony of Singapore. The visuality of the façade was
utilised as a means of connecting the colony of Singapore back to London. It is thus
necessary to turn to the centre of the empire to explore how imperialism was
conceived in built form, in order to understand the implications behind the visuality of
the Municipal Building façade.

The visuality, or neoclassical style of the Municipal Building façade, is made
immediately recognizable through its architectural elements, such as the podium,
images are.” Ludwig Wittgenstein. The Blue and Brown Books (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1958), pp.4 &
89.
47
In the article “What is an Image,” pp.511-512, W.J.T. Mitchell makes the distinction between different kinds of
images. These include graphic, mental and verbal images. Verbal images refer to metaphors, descriptions, and
writing, while graphic images include pictures and designs. Significantly, he posits an equivalence between all
images in representing the world to the mind.
48

Mark Crinson. Modern Architecture and the End of the Empire, (Burlington, VT : Ashgate, c2003), p.3. The
dissemination of the empire through images is referenced from this source unless footnoted otherwise.

38


Corinthian columns, and pediment. Architectural style, however, was not just an
aesthetic issue at the beginning of the twentieth century in Britain.49 The imaging of
architecture had symbolic reverberations that involved the shaping of larger
conceptions, such as the definition of national identity and purpose.50 Thus, coded
within aesthetic judgments, or the choice of one style over another, were political
positions.51

The turn of the century saw the expansion of the British Empire into Africa, which
resulted in huge public enthusiasm for the colonial endeavor.52 Due to popular
sentiments, attempts were made, for the first time, to shape the architecture of London
in order to signify its position as the capital of the British Empire.53 In the choice of
an architectural style to suitably represent the British Empire, the formal classicism of
the beaux-arts tradition was taken up.54 Used by Napoleon III in the late nineteenth
century to represent a revival of French imperial power, the Europeans identified the
beaux-arts tradition with the empire.55 For the British, the classical style was the most
suitable expression for the spirit of the empire, as it evoked the architectural forms of
Greece and Rome.56 In particular, the Roman Empire, as a political power that had
dominated the ancient worlds for centuries, was an exemplar to the British in their
own imperial enterprise.57 With the successful expansion of the empire at the turn of
the century, the British began to conceive of their endeavor as being akin to that of the

49

Jane Ridley. “Edwin Lutyens, New Delhi, and the Architecture of Imperialism”, in Peter Burroughs and A.J.

Stockwell (eds.). Managing the Business of Empire: Essays in Honor of David Fieldhouse (London: Frank Cass,
1998), p.74.
50
Thomas R. Metcalf. An Imperial Vision: Indian Architecture and Britain’s Raj (London: faber and faber, 1989)
p.2.
51
ibid, p.1.
52
ibid, p.176.
53
ibid, p.177.
54
ibid, p.179.
55
ibid, p.178.
56
Andreas Volwahsen. Imperial Delhi: The British Capital of the Indian Empire (Munich: Prestel, 2002), p.78.
57
Thomas R. Metcalf. An Imperial Vision, p.2.

39


Romans.58 Like the Roman Empire, the British imperial enterprise had accumulated
vast political, military and economic power, ruling over expansive regions and
territories.59

Crucially, the most significant scheme implemented in the creation of an “Imperial
London” was the re-imaging of the Buckingham Palace with a beaux-arts façade in
1913.60 The refacing was part of a larger program that saw the reconstruction of the

ceremonial way that led from Buckingham Palace to Trafalgar Square in the classical
style. Like the front elevation of the Municipal Building, the Buckingham Palace
façade possessed an expanded interiority. The façade was not just representative of its
function as the residence and office of the monarch. It was also representative of the
British Empire. Following the successful expansion into Africa, the refacing of the
Buckingham Palace façade in the beaux-arts, or classical style was a necessity, in
order to reflect the growth in political power and influence of the British Empire.

According to architectural historian Thomas Metcalf, the refacing of the Buckingham
Palace façade in the classical style was undertaken not only to reflect the expansion of
the British Empire. It was also an attempt to develop a “national” architectural form.
To Edwin Lutyens, the British architect who conceived the neoclassical design of the
Viceroy’s House in New Delhi, the “line of descent” of classicism as a national style
was clear and simple.61 In a letter written in 1903 to his contemporary Herbert Baker,
Lutyens forwarded that neoclassicism in Britain was derived from “the Greeks, who
handed it to the Romans, they to the great Italians and so on to the Frenchmen and to
58

ibid, p.3.
ibid, p.2.
60
Thomas R. Metcalf. An Imperial Vision, pp.178-179. Subsequent information of the creation of “Imperial
London” is referenced from this source, unless footnoted otherwise.
61
Lutyens to Baker, 15 February 1903, quoted in Christopher Hussey, The Life of Sir Edwin Lutyens (London:
Antique Collector’s Club, 1984), p.121.
59

40

Wren, who made it sane for England.”62 By tracing the roots of neoclassicism in
Britain back to classical baroque architecture of Christopher Wren, Lutyens justified
its claim as a national architectural form. Although classical baroque architecture
originated in Italy, its employment by Wren, one of the architectural greats of
England, made it an English building form. Consequently, neoclassicism was deemed
a fitting image for the empire.

On the other hand, A.J. Balfour, the acting prime minister who oversaw the refacing
of Buckingham Palace, offered another perspective on the use of neoclassical style in
the reconstruction of the Imperial London. For Balfour, the choice of neoclassicism as
an architectural style goes beyond the attempt to endow the visuality of built forms
with an imperial monumentality, or a national identity. For Balfour, the employment
of neoclassical style was to assert the empire’s equivalence with France, the second
largest colonial enterprise after Britain.63 It was a competition of both skills and
technology in constructing the “kind [of architecture] which other nations have shown
examples, [that] we may well easily imitate, and can easily surpass”.64 The outbreak
of World War I in 1914, however, put an end to the ambitious scheme for the creation
of an “Imperial London”.65

While neoclassical architectural form was chosen as the national style of the British
Empire due to its political associations with the colonial enterprise, embodied within
its visuality were certain principles and values. For Baker, classical forms were
suitable for the imperial enterprise due to their “eternal principles of ordered
62

ibid.
Elizabeth and Michael Darby. “The Nation’s Memorial to Victoria”, in Country Life, 16 November 1978,
p.1647.
64

ibid.
65
Thomas R. Metcalf. An Imperial Vision, p.180.
63

41


beauty”.66 As the style of imperial architecture employed by various empires over the
centuries, Baker considered classicism an aesthetic perfection that had endured the
passing of time. The choice of neoclassicism as a national style thus conveyed, in
visual terms, an empire that similarly transcended the vagaries of time. In a paper
titled “Architecture of the Empire”, Baker drew attention to parallels between
classical architectural forms and British colonialism:
Our rule confers order, progress, and freedom within the law to develop national
civilizations… so in architecture there is infinite scope within the limits of order, true
science, and progress… but without the orderly control of the great principles, there
might result a chaos in the arts such as in governments which History records our rule
was ordained to supersede.67

For Baker, the strict geometrical forms and ordered compositions of classicism were
an allegory for the principles of law, order and governance imposed onto the colonies
by the British. Classicism, a hallmark of great civilisations from the Greeks to the
Romans, emphasised the superiority of the British Empire and its ability to “confer
order, progress, and freedom within the law to develop national civilizations”. In the
statement, British colonialism is depicted as a civilising and modernising mission that
brought “order, true science and progress” to the colonies. Conceived as backward
and inferior, the colonies were projected as being ill-equipped to govern themselves,
for “there might result chaos” if the British were not there to take “orderly control of
the great principles”.

By transplanting the national architectural form of classicism into the colony through
the construction of the Municipal Building, a continuity of vision between London
66

Herbert Baker. Architecture and Personalities (London: Country Life, 1944), p.220.
Paper on “Architecture and Empire,” quoted in Robert Irving, Indian Summer: Lutyens, Baker and Imperial
Delhi (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), p.278.
67

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and Singapore was set up. The classicism of the Municipal Building façade made
visible the imperial ties that bound the colony to the heart of the empire. It was an
assertion of sovereignty over Singapore, signposting the island as a British colony. At
the same time, the strict classical composition of the Municipal Building façade
projected the British enterprise in Singapore as a civilizing mission. One that sought
to bring progress and modernity to the colony.

A. Gordon, the municipal architect who worked on the Municipal Building, described
the architecture of the building as “Modern Classic,” a style that “aims at bigness,
simple dignity and the cutting out of superfluous features and decorations.”68 The
“simple” monumentality of the Municipal Building was created through the use of
massive scale, and the application of only the essential classical architectural
elements. The choice of a simple monumentality could be attributed to the economic
conditions of the colony. While the architectural design of the building was conceived
between 1920-25, a recession had set in at the end of 1920, and it was not until 1923
that the colony started to emerge out of the economic slump.69 The Modern Classic
style, which was commonly employed in the built forms of prominent colonial

buildings erected during the 1920s-30s in Singapore, was adopted as it offered “good
simple architectural effect at the minimum costs”.70

With the cutting out of “superfluous features and decorations,” the most prominent
classical element of the Municipal Building façade is its fluted Corinthian columns,
68

A. Gordon. “The Old Order Changeth”, in Journal of Singapore Society of Architects Incorporated, November
1930, p.2.
69
C.M. Turnbull. A History of Modern Singapore 1819-2005, pp.139-140.
70
M.P.H. Keys, quoted in Jiat-Hwee Chang “Tropicalising Technologies of Environment and Government: The
Singapore General Hospital and the Circulation of the Pavilion Plan Hospital in the British Empire, 1860-1930”, in
Michael Guggenheim and Ola Soderstrom (eds.), Re-shaping Cities: How Global Mobility Transforms
Architecture and Urban Form, (London: Routledge, 2010) p.137. The other governmental buildings include but
are not limited to, the General Post Office building, the Singapore General Hospital, and the Supreme Court.

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The twenty-two columns, repeated across the entirety of its length, constitute its most
striking visual element. Rising three-storey high, the columns are colossal in size,
exhibiting a “bigness” that makes it the most conspicuous entity of the façade. The
regularly spaced columns at fixed intervals form the “great [overarching] principle”
guiding the design of the façade, around which other elements such as the stripped
classical windows, pediment, and the central flight of steps is composed.71 The visual
conspicuity of the Corinthian columns can be attributed to it being the “leitmotif of
classicism”, the use of which is the “crux” in the design of neoclassical architecture.72
Other prominent classical motifs employed in the design of the façade are the wide

flight of steps, the podium, and the pediment. The combination of these elements in
the composition of the façade illustrates a strong influence of Roman architectural
form, especially in its reference to the visuality of the Capitoline Temple (Figure 7).

Also known as the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, the Capitoline Temple was
commissioned by the fifth king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Priscus in 525 B.C.73 By
the time of its completion in 509 B.C., Priscus had been ousted in a political upheaval
that resulted in the formation of the Roman Republic. Dedicated by the founders of
the republic to the city, the temple became the symbol of the Roman Republic. Most
fittingly, the construction costs of the temple were paid for from the spoils obtained
through the conquest of a rival city, marking the expansion of the republic. Dedicated

71

Paper on “Architecture and Empire,” quoted in Robert Irving, Indian Summer, p.278.
Herbert Baker, quoted in Robert Irving, Indian Summer, p.105.
73
John W. Stamper. The Architecture of Roman Temples: The Republic to Middle Empire (Cambridge University
Press, 2005), p.1-5. In the book, Stamper introduces the importance of the precedence, or of the influence of
Capitoline Temple, on subsequent Roman temples both symbolically and architecturally. Information on the
Capitoline Temple is referenced from this source unless footnoted otherwise.
72

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Figure 7 Capitoline Temple, 509B.C. Digital reconstruction.

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to Jupiter, the city’s most important deity, the temple was used by successive rulers
and emperors as the setting for ritual and sacrifice in establishing and maintaining
their authority and legitimacy. It exceeded the question of rule by monarchy or
representation, and oversaw the transition of Rome from a monarchy to a republic,
and finally, an empire. Transcending the vagaries of time, the Capitoline Temple was
an enduring political symbol. Damaged thrice by fires in 83B.C., A.D.69 and A.D.80
respectively, the temple was successfully reconstructed each time, with fluted
Corinthian columns replacing the Doric columns employed in its original conception
in 509 B.C.

The Capitoline Temple façade consisted of four main elements: a pitched roof
structure and fascia, the form of which eventually evolved to become the pediment;
regularly spaced fluted Corinthian columns resting on a podium; and a wide flight of
steps aligned at its symmetrical center. In the search for a simple dignity for the
Municipal Building façade, these four components – the pediment, fluted Corinthian
columns, podium and steps – were employed as the essential elements of its
composition. By appropriating the visuality of the most authoritative temple structure
in ancient Rome, the imaging of the City Hall façade exuded an “effect” that went
beyond the visual monumentality generated by the scale and form of its classical
elements.74

The effect was also symbolic, manifested through a series of similarities set up
between the between the Municipal Building and the Capitoline Temple. In addition
to its role as a setting to political ceremonies, the Capitoline Temple was also the site

74

“Municipal Building. Report of the Special Committee”, in The Straits Times, 29 July 1924, p.11.

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