Singapore Design Festival 2009

Announced: Singapore University of Technology & Design

4th university named as Singapore University of Technology and Design
By Hetty Musfirah, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 29 October 2009 1417 hrs

SINGAPORE: Singapore's fourth public-funded university, which is scheduled to open its doors in 2011, has been named the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SU).

Its founding president is Thomas Magnanti, who is an institute professor with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Professor Magnanti's appointment was announced by the new university's Board of Trustees on Thursday. During his three-year term of appointment, Prof Magnanti will be on leave from the MIT faculty and will devote his time fully to the new Singapore university.

The new university will admit its first intake of up to 500 students in two years and students will have four degree programmes to choose from.

These will be in the areas of Architecture & Sustainable Design, Engineering Product Design, Engineering Systems & System Design, and Information Engineering & Design.

First-year students will be exposed to foundation studies in the areas of mathematics, science, introductory humanities and social sciences – all in the context of design. They will also get to learn about entrepreneurship and management during each of the four-year degree programme.

The medium-sized university will eventually cater to some 4,000 undergraduates and 2,000 graduates.

Prof Magnanti said the university will be well-poised to serve Singapore, the region and the world.

"We'll focus on trying to create what we call technical grounded leaders - people who have technology in their hearts and their soul and who will go out to the marketplace with a well-grounded education, and be able to lead all of us, economically and socially, to the future," he said.

The Board said choosing the right person for the top post of SU president was a lengthy process.

Philip Ng, chairman of SU's Board of Trustees, said: "Tom Magnanti is an eminent academician. It was an international search for the founding president that spanned from Singapore... to the far reaches of the world, and we found the right person in Tom Magnanti."

The Board said Professor Magnanti was also chosen because of his familiarity with Singapore. He had spent a considerable time in Singapore over the last 10 years with the Singapore-MIT alliance. He was also the former dean from the School of Engineering at MIT.

His appointment also reflects the close relationship that SU is expected to have with MIT.

The new university is looking to collaborate with MIT in the form of getting experienced professors from MIT to play a leading role in the development of SU's curriculum and exchanging research and education activities with one another.

On discussions to collaborate with a top Chinese university, the Board said details are still being finalised and will be made known before the end of the year.

The university may do away with traditional academic faculties and departments. Its Board said the university may be organised according to technology and science clusters instead. This means academics may not be organised or separated into the four different programmes offered in the university.

The Board said the move will support the inter-disciplinary nature of the university's programmes and encourage collaborations across disciplines.

It said details on the admission process and school fees will be finalised at a later date.

The SU will be located at the Changi Business Park, by 2015. The location of its interim campus will be announced by early next year.


- CNA/so/ir

The Gadget Show

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Green Box

Design IT: Shelter Competition

On the occasion of the exhibitions Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward and Learning By Doing, the Guggenheim and Google SketchUp invited amateur and professional designers from around the world to submit a 3-D shelter for any location in the world using Google SketchUp and Google Earth. Over the course of the summer, nearly 600 contestants from 68 different countries submitted designs that met the competition requirements.

More details here.

Green project at business parks to keep energy costs down

By Esther Ng, TODAY | Posted: 29 October 2009 0700 hrs

	An artist's impression of the Green Roof Trellis project (Courtesy of JTC)

SINGAPORE: Forest canopies keep temperatures in our nature reserves cooler, so could a similar concept have the same effect in our business parks?

Singapore's leading industrial landlord intends to find out, and if it works, industrial clusters here are set to turn a shade of green.

The Green Roof Trellis concept by JTC Corporation aims to lower temperatures in these parks by 2-3°C – which would reduce energy consumption and, hence, electricity bills.

"Climber plants will grow from planter boxes along roof edges of buildings, to a wire mesh structure supported by cables from columns across the rooftops of two buildings," explained JTC senior planner Mr Yio Yang Huat, who came up with the idea. "Over time, plants will grow to cover the entire mesh and provide shade."

This trellis will provide better coverage than conventional awnings or eaves, he added. Besides less power needed for air-conditioning, the benefits include improved air and aesthetics, and a more pedestrian-friendly industrial park.

JTC will pilot the project at its Clean Tech Park in mid-2010. If successful, "there are plans to extend the concept to all buildings," said JTC director of engineering planning Koh Chwee, adding that it will work with the National Parks Board and the Urban Redevelopment Authority.

Ms Valerie Teo, chief executive of car retailer Pinnacle Motors which is located in industrial parks in Sin Ming and Ubi, said:

"Everyone is going in the green direction, so if this saves business cost and reduced carbon emission, it's a win-win. But if it's going to cost tenants, I'm not so sure." The project's cost is still being worked out, said Mr Koh.

Standard Chartered, a tenant of JTC's Changi Business Park, told MediaCorp the green project will transform the operating landscape for firms.

"Having a green building will become a way of doing business and companies will need to look into efficient and sustainable buildings in their portfolio," it said.


- TODAY/so

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Operation Void Deck

The Singapore Institute of Architects (SIA) presents Operation Void Deck – an open competition to design an architectural intervention at the void decks of public housing estates.

The competition has been jointly organised by the SIA, the Marine Parade Town Council, the National Library Board, and Hong Leong Holdings Limited. It aims to generate unique, exciting ideas about how to bring something more to the lives of residents, and show how architecture and design can impact upon society.

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ULO 2009

For the inaugural Unidentified Lighting Object (U.L.O) 2009, which is organized by whenlightswork collective and kindly sponsored by IKEA Singapore, we would be seeing a total of 25 invited designers, from celebrated creatives to emerging designers, all across different design disciplines, work their magic on a conventional IKEA item they would each choose. As part of the runway challenge (pardon the pun), the theme, “Masak Masak”, had been proposed. All designers are invited to translate an intimate part of their childhood memories into a tangible story through their designs.

With the interesting mix of emerging and renowned designers, coupled with the support from IKEA Singapore, one would certainly be anticipating a lot of “Unidentified Lighting Object”s from this experiment.

An exhibition cum sale of all the designs would be held at the Tampines IKEA store, from 24th of October to 31st October. Admission is free.