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Talking About Detail: Architecture Façade

by with No Comment General

On January 2nd 2019 IAI Bali or Indonesian Architect Association in Bali held the second SERASI exhibition in Sanur Prime Plaza. Just like last year, they also had a Pecha Kucha Night in this year exhibition. All the exhibitors would present their panel for only 3 minutes each. The theme for this year was “Architecture Façade,” where they mainly focus on the face of the building. We were also participated as one of the exhibitors, along with 30 others participants.

Over 30 exhibitors participated in SERASI exhibition held by IAI Bali

Before getting into our projects, first of all, let us talk about what actually a façade is? According to the Cambridge Dictionary, façade is the front/face of the building, especially a large or attractive building. It is a foreign loan word from the French word, façade, meaning frontage or face. Façade became one of the most important aspects in architecture. As the face of the building, it is normally the first thing to be seen by people. It will set the whole personality and character for the rest of the design.

Because of structural regulations in some cities, many buildings go with standard design but often lack of characteristic. But in other places, architects can have the freedom to design a façade to be eye-catching and full of personality, emphasizing the overall building design. In designing the façade, there are a lot of things to be considered to; a couple to mention is visual and functional values. We will talk more about that as we explain about our projects.

For the exhibitions, we submitted two panels from two of our projects, Jelita Sejuba Resort in Natuna Island and Coco Plaza Mandalika in Lombok. These two projects have different type and function for their façade.

The first project is Jelita Sejuba Resort. We have mentioned it on our previous blog article, but basically the resort is located in the border island where it has an astonishing landscape and virgin nature. The most prominent characteristic is the hundred years old gigantic boulders. The rocks are very unique and it will give a distinct characteristic to the whole building. Because they are scattered throughout the site, we don’t want to mess around too much. We basically just blend the building with these rocks to create more natural and aesthetically pleasing façade for the resort.

As for the other project, Coco Plaza Mandalika, it is located in the Special Economic Zone where there are some regulations that we need to follow. One of them is to apply cultural values to the buildings. For SHL Asia, we love incorporating cultural element on to our design, and we have been experimenting with various designs inspired by Sasak (traditional Lombok tribe) culture. Because the project will be a commercial building, we had to not only consider the visual value, but it also has to be functional. Hence we design the façade to capture to essence of traditional Sasak house by applying square patterns that will display the inside of the plaza. Furthermore, we apply the pattern of traditional Lombok woven fabric on the roof to add a colorful touch. Therefore not only the façade will follow the area’s regulation, but it will also fulfill its visual and functional values as a commercial building.

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Spirit of The New Year: SHL Asia Reflects on The Previous Year

by with No Comment General

First of all, a new year often provides opportunities to look back and reflect. 2018 was quite of a year. To sum up, it was somewhat like a roller coaster ride, we had a lot of ups and few downs. We try to focus on the good as we got some amazing projects going on, we have tried things we have not done in the past, we explored new places, and we have made new friends but some people also left.

One of the most impressive feats was probably that we have rebirthed once again. We developed the new philosophy and transformed ourselves with the new look, calmer and more mature. The journey of SHL Asia’s transformation is the combination of ideas and efforts from a lot of people that had put into this project. We collaborated with an amazing graphic designer and brand developer, Esha Satrya, to create the ‘Campuhan Script’ philosophy.

courtesy of @eshaswork
courtesy of @eshaswork
courtesy of @eshaswork

courtesy of @eshaswork

We basically just added more values to our old Campuhan philosophy. We applied cultural and art values into our design and way of doing business. Our aim is to deliver the A-grade services but still down to earth just as reflected in our new logo, a Balinese kawi script of “a/ha” in a lowercase letter. To know more about our rebranding journey and the person behind it, do check our second issue of Design by Style in the link below.

Design by Style Issue no. 2

Another highlight of our projects last year was Jelita Sejuba Resort that will sit on the border of Indonesia. It is our architecture project in Natuna, Riau Islands. We made a huge step by exploring new places we have never been to before. Natuna is yet another slice of untouched paradise that is located in most northern part of Indonesia.

We are humbled and thrilled at the same time because Jelita Sejuba Resort will be the first ever resort in Natuna Island. The government encourages people to visit and discover Natuna, and of course we are more than happy to take part in it. For more details, watch the video of Jelita Sejuba Resort and more of our projects from last year in our Youtube account.

These two are just a couple of milestones we have achieved last year, but 2018 was more than just these projects. It was also the laughter, the many hours of works and deadlines and especially the togetherness we share as a team. Like always, we wish to be better than before and we are super excited for many more exciting things this year.

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Introducing: Workspace and Culture

by with No Comment Company UpdatesGeneral

SHL Asia is introducing you the new space to channel creativity and culture. Through Workspace and Culture we want to present people the new side of us. People can find numerous landscapes and architecture consultants in the country, but what distinguishes us with the rest is how we present our brand as a whole. So people will not only recognize us through our landscape and architecture work but also through our platforms where we bring up topics about design, cultures and arts.

It all started with our new office (look forward in the first half of 2019!). This will be one of the representations of the big theme “Workspace and Culture”. The definition of workspace is simply an area which we work in. Nowadays, some people might confuse a workspace as a creative space. It is because the term ‘workspace’ corresponds with a place that supports one to be productive and creative to work. So, why not we just use the term ‘creative space’? Although it is somewhat true, but this could mislead the word ‘work’ into a not-so-good connotative. Some people would think that ‘doing work’ is boring, dull and simply not innovative enough. When in fact being creative, innovative as well as making engagement are parts of ‘doing work.’

In creating our ideal workspace, we will incorporate the element of culture into our studio and work. Culture can be presented in many kind of form, for example a studio with an open display gallery, whether it comprises with local paintings or ethnic artworks. We will present cultural awareness, collaborative talk, trend design as well as a closer look of what SHL Asia really is.  Culture awareness is crucial for us in the creative industry, as most of our works are influenced by especially the Balinese culture.

In creating our ideal workspace, we will incorporate the element of culture into our studio and work. Culture can be presented in many kind of form, for example a studio with an open display gallery, whether it comprises with local paintings or ethnic artworks. We will present cultural awareness, collaborative talk, trend design as well as a closer look of what SHL Asia really is.  Culture awareness is crucial for us in the creative industry, as most of our works are influenced by especially the Balinese culture.

Moreover, we will introduce the new culture in the new workspace. The purpose is to eliminate the bad working cultures, preserve the good ones and add the new working cultures. The culture will not just be any culture, but it will be based on our philosophy, The Campuhan Script as it also applies in our new logo. We will implement the river philosophy as a good work ethic which will give us the positive energy and creative workflow like Campuhan (the point where the two rivers meet) to our new workspace. While the (Balinese) script will be applied as well to our new working culture, which means that the Balinese social life and architecture culture will be inserted into art and design form for the output in our work and studio.

Creating a distinct cultured workspace is a challenge as well as an opening. It is not an easy job but definitely a good opportunity to reintroduce the new means of ‘working’ in the creative industry. With the new culture, we wish to deliver a better service and product as well as raising our brand awareness.

Cheers,

SHL Asia Team

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Artwork: The Storyteller

by with No Comment Company UpdatesGeneral

Art As Part of Us

Art has been a part of human culture in some capacity or other since ancient times. It serves as a medium of not only personal self-expression, but also as a way to communicate the artist’s view of reality to other people. Working in the design industry allows us to create our own medium to express our idea. We can convey it not only through architecture and landscape design but also down to the pieces of the artworks. Artwork is an inseparable element in architecture and landscape. Some say it is the soul, others say it is the characteristic of the design as a whole. Artwork communicates the concept, and often the display of artwork more than pleases the eyes, but also touches the heart. Furthermore,not only for aesthetic values but the display of artwork is functioned as many things including for lighting, water fountain and even stepping.

We always incorporate many kind of artworks into our landscape design following each concept. Artwork can be translated into many forms including statues, sculptures, paintings, photography and installment. Depending on the space, 2 dimension artwork like painting and photography often displayed inside the building. While 3 dimension artwork such sculpture and art installation is normally exhibited outdoor as it typically takes up space. We mostly display statue, sculpture or water feature since we have numerous number of landscape project.

The Artwork of SHL Asia

Each project of course, has different concept with its artwork, some of the examples include our Natya project, Tanadewa project and Hyatt project. Following its landscape concept which is incorporating the village’s life of Bali and elevate it to the hospitality level, the artworks in our Natya resort project inspired by the things we often see in the villages. These things could be objects like chicken cages and cow bells or even the village people themselves, as we portrayed them in a relief on a wall along the pathway. The relief tells stories about daily activity in the village like a mother feeding their children or the farmer harvesting his crop.

Our other project, takes on the concept of the gods and goddess from the folk story. As like the name “Tanadewa” from Tana (land) and Dewa (God) which means Land of the Gods, the design of the artworks portrays this concept. We display a relief of the dancing goddess in some spots inside the resort. There is also a relief of Balinese mythology about Arjunawiwaha which is the story about Arjuna getting rewarded with 7 beautiful apsaras (female spirit in a Hindu culture) after accomplishing some tasks. All the statues and relief are nicely done by our artwork supplier, 66 Pottery Bali.

Different concept and artwork is displayed in Hyatt Regency Sanur. This resort is one of the pioneers in the island. We are restoring it without erasing the original characteristic of Hyatt. Working on the landscape design, we are collaborating with Tiera Design from Thailand and Ketut Suratman from Rimba Bali. In creating the statues and sculptures, we team up with the local Bali sculpture, I Wayan Sugawa from Taro Arca Dewata which has more than 20 years as a sculptor. All the newer artworks including statues, water fountains and fire torches are implementing the classic Balinese style, with the more antique feels.

Most of our landscape designs integrate tropical Balinese concept, with lush vibrant softscape combines with natural materials like woods and different kind of stones for the hardscape. Therefore our pieces of artwork are also mostly influenced with Balinese style and characteristic. We enhanced it with the flair of local values such tropical wildlife and nature, Bali daily life, or folk stories. We let our designs act as the storyteller to enhance people different life experiences. The aim is not necessarily to create the artwork that would be loved or not loved, but to add something new to the whole design and make people think about it.

Cheers,

SHL Asia Team

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The Weekend House Project: A Balinese Style Architecture in the City of Rain

by with No Comment GeneralProject Updates

Indonesia has thousands of islands with multicultural traditions that embellish every corner of the island. Every city holds different custom and characteristic that distinguish them from one another, but it doesn’t necessarily belong to one. Taking this architecture project as an example, the owner wanted to bring the Balinese architecture in to the City of Rain, Bogor, in West Java. Although Balinese architecture is influenced by ancient Javanese elements, this centuries-old style of design is also heavily influenced by Bali’s Hindu traditions making it very distinctly unique as well as appropriate in the highland of Bogor.

This private weekend house nestled amidst the beautiful nature of Bogor. Living in a big city, the owners yearned for relaxing exclusive retreat surrounded by nature and tranquility. The location is hidden from the buzzling crowd of the city but is still reachable. It was built for their weekend getaway when they want to spend peaceful quality time with their family and friends. Hence we designed the house to be spacious with a lot of features to maximize the user convenient and comfort, such as large living room and dining room, a greenhouse for gardening and a reading/lounging corner.

In a 3 hectares area comprise of rice fields and plantation land, the buildings stand amid the stunning surrounding of pine forest and a crystal clear river. Because of its amazing view, we wanted to preserve the nature and keep the building area just enough to accommodate all the needs. We built the house on less than 10% of the whole area. The house was also built on a mound land area where it used to be an existing building, without ruining the agricultural land. The owner wanted to keep the rice fields and most of the existing plantation and trees as they are so the land workers can still work on the agricultural.

Although the owners are not originated from Bali, they take a huge interest in Balinese culture. As a result we designed the building very much influenced by the Balinese architecture style. Like on most houses in Bali, we implemented some of the Balinese building’s characteristics. We implemented pepalihan, a form of stair-like shape arranged repeatedly in three levels upward or downward that function as a design feature. Another feature is Balinese houses’ exposed ceiling, where we can see the wooden roof structure (usuk).

Following the concept, we applied materials that are commonly found in the Balinese structures, such kerobokan paras stone for the walls, exposed red bricks and sirap roof from ironwood. For the roof, we employed knockdown roof structures that we brought over from Bali. Most of the materials used to construct the buildings were carried straight from Bali so they would really give the authentic feels. The artworks also take on Balinese characteristic with wooden statues and a lot of carvings.

Surrounded by beautiful lush greeneries and trees, we designed a lot of opening for the buildings. Each building has big windows and door glasses for view purposes and as a direct access to the nature. These openings also allow light and air to circulate into the building. The establishment of Balinese style houses in West Java landscape is just one of the displays of the harmonious diversity of Indonesia architectural culture. We could not be anymore pleased than to project Balinese architecture style in a land outside the Island of Bali.

Cheers,

SHL Asia team

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Company Anniversary: Celebrate The Journey of SHL Asia

by with No Comment Company UpdatesGeneral

Happy 8th year anniversary SHL Asia!!! Last week of July marked our 8th anniversary of being in the business. As they say, success is a journey and not a destination. While our success story will keep going on, we have set a milestone of completion of eight successful years into our landscape and architecture projects and of course a lot of hard work. Indeed, 8 is not a fairly big number but so many things have had happened that have shaped us into as we are right now. On 2010, our co-founders – embarked on their journey towards the dream of creating landscape hospitality architecture. As the number grows, we still strive in making beautiful designs and delivering the best service to the client.

Without a doubt, any company’s business growth depends upon the hard work of all employees. No individual can ever take the credit of all those years of success and hard work alone. The accomplishments of a company are the results of the combined efforts of every individual and team work. And although nothing can ever sufficiently show the appreciation, we wanted to celebrate our journey with all the employees of SHL Asia. Here is the greatest gratitude for the dedication, for the hard work and of course for all the ideas and inspirations. A feast by the beach, the casual and personal vibe, and nothing but good time.

We are celebrating this for all the hard work, laugh, sweat and the devotion that we have poured in to the success of SHL Asia. We started out small however we had big visions and always put our mind into providing a level of service with an aim to outdo ourselves. All we want to say is thank you to everyone who has supported us, worked with us, taken a chance on us and believed in us. Here is to many, many more exciting and inspiring years ahead!

Cheers,

SHL Asia team

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The New Means of Hospitality: Redefining Luxury

by with One Comment GeneralProject Updates

Welcome to Cloud Nine

The amazing fertility of the Balinese soil has accorded the Balinese a lot of leisure time, aside from their work as peasants, and stimulated their imagination and creativity. They would channel their creativity in such artistic ways even down on to their daily activities, such as the art of making offerings and the custom of rituals and ceremonies. Blessed with breathtaking nature and rich culture makes Bali is a hotspot for a restful and relaxing retreat. No wonder numerous lavish resorts and polished villas spring in every corner of the island, making it the island of hospitality, as well as a luxurious vacation destination. Breaking the stereotype of “luxury villa”, Cloud Nine Esatate is one of our landscape projects in Ubud has proven to portray a new approach to luxury hospitality.

Tucked in a cliff top of Ubud, Cloud Nine Estate may not look as it seems from the outside. It is veiled from the bustling crowd of people, away from the hustle of downtown Ubud, a hidden gem amidst the lush greens of Ubud. From the main road, the guests follow a mossy stairway down to the estate; and are served a million dollar view of the massive Wos River and valley.  The estate consists of 3 different houses at the moment (who knows if they would expand anytime soon!), named Star Cloud Villa, Lotus Cloud Villa and Angel Cloud is a two storey villa comprising three suites – Anjali, Tara and Dewi suite. We made each villa to have a different focal point and unique features, like the amazing cliff edge panoramic view, the beautiful tropical garden or a direct access to the infinity shared pool.

We designed the landscape to be as eye-catching to complement the whole concept really well. The first impression guests receive on arrival is an all-white themed angkul-angkul (Balinese gate) and boundary wall that somewhat reminds them of arriving at a dreamy peaceful sanctuary. We felt the color white really brings out ‘the Cloud Nine’ vibe down to the every boundary wall and pathway, as it also stands out among the greens surrounding the estate. A “heavenly” feeling… That was exactly what the client wished to deliver to the guests, for them to experience ultimate calmness and tranquility as they enter the Cloud Nine, therefore we assisted them to achieve this.

Luxury at its finest

Cloud Nine mission is to redefine luxury. What exactly is the meaning of “redefining luxury?” A fancy chandelier, some high-tech facilities or marbled floor and tables will come up in a lot of people’s mind when they think of luxury resort, but it is different when it comes to the Cloud Nine Estate. Cloud Nine Estate aims to re conceptualize luxury as so much more than fancy things, luxury that is found in the smallest and simplest details.Things like hand-picked vegetable from the garden, the personal care and connection from people of the village and the vibrant sound of nature waking you up in the morning. In short, it is something that is felt by the heart. We loved the idea and delighted to help them making it come true through our landscape design.

The timeless echo architecture

The architecture of their buildings was inspired from the owner previous home in Singapore with big walls and monochromatic color of white and grey. It was a colonial tropical villa that has lasted since World War I. It lasted without the need for much maintenance or changing of materials. The building was showcasing many eco-architectural features such as cross-ventilation and strategic shading. The houses applied simple yet strong materials with a lot of white polished cement.

The landscape of course, synergized the concept of the building. We inspired to bring in the simplicity of localness from one of the traditional villages. It is designed with massive walls and few plantations. We kept it to be very simple yet eye-catching, with only a touch of green plants and trees amidst the white washed ocean of walls and floors. On the landscape, we applied white terrazzo as the pathway and a little touch of woods on the decks. Even with the artworks and design features, the clients involved so much in the process, carefully hand-picking them to create a harmonious atmosphere and we helped them creating the design that contains of local story. We also made sure to not ruin the aesthetic by adding to much color to the whole picture.

Embraced by the sturdy old colonial houses, the client wished for the villa to be long lasting with a minimum amount of maintenance and remodeling. The overall design is very timeless and eco-friendly. We have worked together to apply the concept very neatly in every aspect of the estate and consistently practice in to every slight detail, proven why they are the global winner for the luxury eco villa. Cloud Nine Estate manage to accentuate the luxury in the simplest thing in life and deliver them splendidly to the guest, since truly the best things in life are often felt by heart. We are so thrilled to be involved in such an inspiring project.

Cheers,

SHL Asia Team

IMAGE COURTESY: @CLOUDNINEESTATE
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Landscaping A Tropical Garden: An Oasis In the Midst of Limestone Field

by with No Comment GeneralProject Updates

Aesthetically pleasing tropical garden

One should appear lush and vibrant; this can be accomplished through dense planting of proper trees, greens and flowering plants. A tropical garden must features tropical plants and requires a good deal of sunlight and a warm, moist climate. These gardens need a good amount of water from either rainfall or decent irrigation system or sprinkler system in order to thrive well. In planting out the garden, there are some things to consider about. The major variables include the location of the site, and the placement and density of the plants and the selection of softscape and hardscape. It all of course, comes back to the personal preference, but in creating a good aesthetically pleasing garden will have to contemplate on these variables. In this month’s article we will bring you a case study from one of our landscape projects: Kapungkur Villa.

An arid hills

The villa is located in Karangsari, a village in Jimbaran. Geographically the area is in South Kuta, Badung district. The area is more known as Bukit (hills) where most of the area is situated on a karst plateau. Unlike the area in the north part of Badung where the land consists of volcanic materials, Bukit area is mostly contain of limestone. Contrasting from the other parts of Badung which the soil holds a lot of minerals making it very fertile, the soil in Bukit area is rather dry and not suitable for agriculture. The area also only has periodic rivers where the water only flows when it is raining and the groundwater filling process only happens during the rainy season. Although sited in a dry location, it did not stop the owner to seek after creating a green oasis.

Throwback from the past

The landscape concept idea of the villa was royal village. The owner wanted to give out the nuance of the past hence, the name itself, “Kapungkur” comes from a Sundanese word which means dahulu (the past). It would show the characteristic of royal village with contemporary looks, privacy and involves historical value in the components of the landscape. It also has a mixed of Javanese and Balinese traditional contemporary style. The villas are using frameworks of a traditional Javanese house, or Joglo, with the Balinese accents here and there.

The first step is..

Before selecting the variety of plants, we first must have to identify the “issue” on the site. The biggest issue with this site was the existence of an apartment building behind it. The apartment is at least a few stories building. This gave it a viewing access over the site, affecting the privacy of the villa. Therefore, in order to sort it out, we chose to plant tall trees like coconut tree (cocos nucifera) and wide, dense trees such African tulip tree (spatodhea campanulata) along the border wall in the back area. Further, to really block the view from the top, we built a a six meters vertical garden with double butterfly pea (clitoria ternatea var. pleniflora) that would also give appealing visual with its violet flowers.

In addition, the owner wished to bring the lushness to this dry area. As a result, we had to select plants and trees that would grow well with such condition and still appear vibrant and dense in order to deliver that kind of ambience to the landscape. Therefore, we chose a variety of different high and low shrubs from crystal anthurium (anthurium crystallinum), giant taro (alocasia macrorrhizos), cuban cigar (calathea lutea), plum aralia (polyscias scutellaria) to fern-leaf aralia (polyscias cumingiana). Most of this vegetation will thrive well with moderate water and full sun exposure. It made them suitable with the soil condition in Bukitarea, but of course still follows with intense maintenance. Some of these shrubs could be found around the yard in old village houses. This would bring the traditional value and nostalgic nuance to the residence. We also planted flamboyant (delonix regia) and bael (aegle marmelos) on a few spots to add some accents

The magic touch of hardscape

Aside from softscape, the presence of hardscape in a tropical garden is as crucial. It functions as the “backbone” of the garden by giving it structure and unifies it with the surrounding environment, completing the whole vista. We installed a few ponds, a pool and some traditional-contemporary artworks around the site.

The gardens of Kapungkur Villa built in two levels following the contour of the site. We built the main ponds on higher parts of a property so that they can gravity-feed water down the garden and ponds below, creating a little creek. Combining the water element to the landscape would appeal to all the senses, enhancing peacefulness and freshness.

For the artworks, we set up statues and a Balinese relief on the wall to follow the whole concept of Kapungkur. To achieved our costumed artworks we also worked together with the local artists and craftsmen to really bring out the sense of localness.

There are many things to consider in planning out and creating a beautiful functioning tropical garden. Things like location and the condition of soil will determine what kind of plants will be planted on the site. The desired concept will as well decide the placement and density of each softscape and hardscape. As in building the tropical garden of Kapungkur Villa, its location was the main thing to really consider about. Therefore we selected the plants that would only need fewer requirements but still grow beautifully. We placed them with a combination of different heights to make it appear dense and lush. And then wrapped all up with the touch of appropriate hardscapes to the landscape. The outcome came out harmoniously as projected in the video down below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=478n2cDmdHI

Cheers,

SHL Asia team