An Insider's Look: 21 Carpenter Singapore

Following a restoration by WOHA, 21 Carpenter comprises with four historic shophouses and a contemporary extension, preserving original features in line with URA guidelines. The facade, adorned with Shanghai plaster from the 1930s, showcases Chinese characters listing remittance destinations. Poetic details such as the Urban Wing's aluminium art facade features excerpts from the original remittance letters, adding a touch of history to the building. This remarkable establishment is reborn from meticulous restoration efforts that aim to preserve the past, while embracing the future.

Positioned between Clarke Quay and Boat Quay, 21 Carpenter enables guests to fully engage in the vibrant streets of Singapore's CBD and Chinatown area.

The 21 Carpenter Art Collection was carefully curated by The Artling, and immerses visitors in the vibrancy of Singapore's thriving art community.

Project Information

Location: Singapore
Client: 8M
Project Type: Hospitality
Project Scope: Public Areas
Services Provided: Art Consultancy
Interior Designer: WOHA
Status: Completed
Artling Project Team: Talenia Phua Gajardo, Ivy Chang
Year Completed: 2023

Process and Collaborators

The Artling worked with various talented local artists to curate and commission artworks that would resonate with the narrative and ambience of the hotel's space. The roster of featured artists extends to include talents like Heman Chong, Dawn Ang of Aeropalmics, Ruben Pang, Jamie Teo, Aarti Bartake, Soph O, and others, contributing to the diverse and enriching artistic atmosphere within the hotel.

The resulting acrylic paper pulp pieces of MoonCloud 3 are assembled architecturally, providing viewers with a dynamic experience from various distances. The varying height levels in the assemblage create an immersive sensation, inviting viewers to engage both from afar and up close. Victor's innovative approach challenges conventional notions of painting, transforming printmaking into a three-dimensional 'watercolor' landscape with striking geometric and abstract qualities.

Readers and Writers #1 by Heman Chong is the first in a series of tapestries reflecting on the boundless world of literature and the profound impact it has on our lives, specially commissioned for this project. Through extensive research and detailed sketches, Heman Chong and The Artling translated the concept into this vibrant artwork through careful selection of threads from vast colour samples to ensure the work integrates into the space seamlessly.

For this mural created by Dawn Ang of Aeropalmics, the inspiration was taken from a sentence extracted from historical remittance letters quoting, “时间真如流水不情” which translates to “Time flows relentlessly like water”. Mocking up the mural allowed the artist to strategically plan the design, exploring different concepts to find the perfect one to visually represent the emotions carried within the quote. This exploration was done through various sketches and experimentation with materials that would best suit the design elements of the space.

Khairulddin Wahab’s commissioned paintings weave narratives drawn from anthropology, environmental history, and post-colonialism in Singapore and Southeast Asia. By meticulously selecting found images and iconography derived from his geographic and cultural contexts, Wahab created these visual tableaus that allude to the historico-political encounters with the natural world, perfectly incapsulating the local artists narrative that the project requires.

The Art Collection

The Art Collection, thoughtfully curated by The Artling, showcases a vibrant assembly of both emerging and established Singaporean artists, whose works adorn various spaces throughout the entire hotel.

In her recent series at STPI Creative Workshop, Suzann Victor, an abstract painter, performance, and installation artist, seamlessly blended her diverse artistic elements into mesmerizing print and paper explorations. Notably, she redefined the role of paper by using colored paper pulp as a liquid paint medium poured onto acrylic surfaces.

The Lobby is graced by a captivating tapestry by Heman Chong, his first piece utilising this medium.

The varied blocks of color, each representing a different book, symbolize the diversity of human experiences, perspectives, and knowledge that is encapsulated within the pages of countless texts. They demonstrate how the library, as a repository of these stories, serves as a sanctuary for wisdom, a testament to the collective knowledge of humanity.

The tapestry becomes a bridge connecting the authors, who contribute their voices to the world's collective wisdom, to the readers who draw inspiration, knowledge, and solace from these texts. It underscores the transformative power of storytelling, highlighting how readers, in the act of reading, breathe life into the written words and make them a part of their own personal narratives.

Khairulddin Wahab's artworks, Dwellers in the Mirage and Visions of Splendour, stun visitors of the restaurant, Kee's, that sits opposite the lobby.

Dwellers in the Mirage allude to the projection of colonial ideals on the tropics and its subsequent construction of the tropical space. The painting is influenced by narratives around ecology and power in the age of empire.

While Visions of Splendour make reference to the transformation of tropical environments in the image of empire and its legacies on the land.

The Rooftop Infinity Pool & Lounge features a hand-drawn charcoal mural created by Dawn Ang of Aeropalmics, depicting ethereal clouds drifting over Clarke Quay. This piece plays on the mapped location of the hotel nestled at the edge of the bay, echoing fluidity, movement and changing nature of water as a reflection of time.

Within the context of Man and Machine series, Shih Yun Yeo employs unconventional painting implements such as toy robots, transcending the boundaries of traditional artistic tools. This departure from convention serves a profound purpose: to relinquish control and liberate the act of drawing from the perceived constraints of the artist's hand. The deliberate interplay between the artist's direct involvement through hand-rendered elements and the autonomous contributions of mechanical devices encapsulates a fascinating dichotomy.

In this epoch dominated by advanced technologies, epitomized by the rise of artificial intelligence, Shih Yun's series beckons a crucial question: Can humanity and technology find a symbiotic accord, a harmonious coalescence in creative expression? This query serves as a poignant exploration into the evolving dynamics of human interaction with machinery, prompting contemplation on the potential intersections between the organic and the mechanical realms.

Comet i: i’ll Drift on My Hilltop and You Can Rest on Yours reflects on the theme of insularity and continentally. There is a desire to demarcate territories, an urgency to establish a sense of place for both the visitor and the local. Soph O was interested in the tensions that arise when the locals leave their own country to live somewhere else and return after awhile. A sense of deep displacement occurs for the one who has left, a sense of discomfort and uncanniness takes over. Home is no longer home; one becomes a stranger in his or her own land.

Soph O's work often explores physical displacement, evolutionary dislocation and re-imagined realities. Other stranger realities are possible deals with notions of home, transitional places and what constitutes a natural space. The raw wood is dressed with images from memory, and those images resolve differently at different scales.

Aarti Bartake’s artistic signature lies in her vibrant and dynamic use of colors. Her artworks resonate with an uplifting and positive energy, evoking feelings of joy, wonder, and delight. Her expressive abstracts embrace nature and human interactions in a unique manner to create alluring masterpieces that can emerge from chaos and uncertainties to a captivating choreography of vibrant colors and compelling shapes, delicately poised between tumultuousness and serenity.

In Secrets of the Sea, Aarti Bartake delve into the depths of her profound love for nature, a lifelong passion that has inspired and shaped her artistic journey. This abstract artwork is a heartfelt homage to the awe-inspiring beauty of our natural world, with a particular focus on the mesmerizing wonders concealed beneath the waves.

Nicholas Ong is a Singaporean artist and painter. His practice navigates the juncture between perception and reception through his experiments as an artist. His works, rooted in personal narratives and external experiences, seek to challenge conventional definitions through painterly sensibilities. Oscillating between social interactions and solitude, Ong explores this through tangible and intangible mediums, employing light as paint to challenge the boundaries of installations and paintings.

Twisted Metal is a word play on the manipulation of permeable materials with great difficulty. This is in reference to the extended and enduring history of painting within art, and the great effort to manipulate both the physical medium as a painter but also the perception of the medium's intrinsic purpose. The work seeks to challenge its own identity as a painting through its sculptural qualities crafted on a contemplative reconsideration of its basis as a two dimensional medium.

Television Static draws from the electric resonance from the screens of tube televisions in the 90s and early 2000s as a metaphor for the three dimensional effect from a two dimensional surface. It speaks to the tensions that exists as a ‘hair raising’ byproduct of what is now an aged technology.

Drawn by the peculiar sensation of not being able to focus on any particular area within the surface of colours in her abstract works, Jamie Teo invites viewers to experience a different approach to seeing by meticulously blending colours to both create and investigate its movement and ambiguous outcomes.

In the act of blending between the layers of paint and staring into the spaces between colours for a certain amount of time, forms and colours begin to appear and disappear. The repetitive action of moving and pushing paint on the surface of the canvas yet every stroke produces something different, colours begin to lead me through each layer; movement and gesture remain stagnant as the painting transforms freely.

Ruben Pang’s artistry focuses on automatism, the neurosis and drama of the human condition. Beginning with painting, Pang’s practice has also led him to explore the dynamism and spontaneous response sculpture and the sensitivities and collaborative spirit of music production and performance. Working without a preconceived image of the final composition, his approach allows the imagery to surface spontaneously; a “visual syncopation, like searching for a melody in white noise”.

About 21 Carpenter

Heritage hotel 21 Carpenter officially opened its doors to guests on 6 December 2023. This former remittance house, recognized as the historic birthplace of banking in Singapore, seamlessly combines heritage and modern elements following a contemporary renovation by the renowned architectural firm WOHA.

Boasting 48 exquisite rooms, a Neo-Bistro and Bar, a Rooftop Infinity Pool & Lounge, locally curated art and more, 21 Carpenter promises an unforgettable stay. Conveniently nestled between the vibrant nightlife of Clarke Quay and historically significant Chinatown, guests can immerse themselves in a captivating blend of cultural allure and modern charm.

A special thank you to all the participating artists, designers and galleries for working with us on this amazing project!

To browse more of our projects, head over to our Consultancy page!