William S. W. Lim 1932 -2023
William S W Lim 1932 - 2023?
William S W Lim, architect, thinker, conservationist and some say creative rebel passed away Friday 6 January 2023. He was 91.?
William will be remembered for the buildings that he and his partners gifted us in the form of the Singapore Conference Hall and Trade Union House (1965), People’s Park Complex (1972), Golden Mile Complex (1974), Marine Parade Community Club (2000-2023) and many others in Malaysia like the Negeri Sembilan State Mosque (1967).?
These he accomplished while partner in first the Malayan Architects Co-Partnership (1960-1967), then the Design Partnership (later DP Architects) (1967-1981), and then William Lim Associates (1981-2002).
Today, the Singapore Conference Hall and Trade Union House is a National Monument and Golden Mile Complex was just gazetted as a conservation building in 2021.?
Born in Hong Kong to a Singaporean father and a Hong Kong mother in 1932, William received his architectural education from the Architectural Association (AA) in London in 1955. In 1956, William was awarded a Fullbright Scholarship to study with Walter Groupius, José Luis Sert and Jacqueline Tyrwhitt at Harvard University.
A little known fact about William Lim was that he initially wanted to work for the Public Works Department upon his return to Singapore but was rejected because he was overqualified. If William had indeed worked for the PWD, Singapore (and Malaysia) may look somewhat different from what it does today.?
Apart from architecture, William Lim was also deeply concerned about the human condition and used his training as an architect to try and make Singapore a better place.?
Together with his partners at the Design Partnership - Tay Kheng Soon and Koh Seow Chuan as well as a number of their peers, William cofounded the Singapore Planning and Urban Research Group (S.P.U.R.) in 1965, a think-tank that sought to offer an independent voice with regards to urban planning issues in early independent Singapore. Other founding members of S.P.U.R. included luminaries in the field of architecture like Wee Chwee Heng, Edward Wong and Chan Sau Yan. Among the suggestions offered by S.P.U.R. very early on was an adoption of a mass rapid transit network instead of one completely reliant on buses and also to shift the international airport to Changi instead of keeping it at Paya Lebar. William Lim was S.P.U.R.’s first chairman.
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In 1976, William played a large part in helping his wife Lena Lim U Wen start her own bookshop - Select Books. Select Books was Singapore’s very first independent bookshop and later also became a publisher. Many of William Lim’s books would be published by Select Books.?
In 1984, Select Books published Pastel Portraits: Singapore's Architectural Heritage, a book by Gretchen Liu that William was a part of, having originated from a conference by the Singapore Coordinating Committee on the adaptive reuse of old buildings. It would not be an exaggeration to say that Pastel Portraits saved whatever shophouses we have left today and turned the public’s view of them from being old, dilapidated and outdated to architectural heritage treasures. Pastel Portraits remains one of the most important books ever published locally in the field of architectural conservation.?
In 1986, William Lim became the inaugural President of the newly formed Singapore Heritage Society, which he helped to found. The Singapore Heritage Society remains a vocal advocate of built heritage conservation today.?
In 2000, William Lim Associates completed one of the very first integrated hubs for the government in the form of the Marine Parade Community Building. A truly postmodern edifice that polarised both members of the public as well as those in authority, William shrugged off any praises for it by saying in a TODAY interview from 2002 that “I don’t even think the clients like it very much!” Ironically, a last ditch effort by DOCOMOMO.SG to save the icon of Marine Parade was failing just as William’s health was also quickly deteriorating after a few years of illness. In the end, Marine Parade Community Building has outlived William, but only by a few months at most.?
I had the honour and privilege of meeting William in 2018 when I published Before It All Goes and presented a copy to him and his family. In that meeting, he showed me original copies of the S.P.U.R. Journal and we talked a little about architecture. Mostly, I was just in awe of being in his presence.?
My former supervisor from NUS Professor Chua Beng Huat has perhaps the most succinct statement for Willie as he was fondly known by those close to him - “One discovers William is always open to new ideas, gained through his extensive travelling abroad and incessant reading. Consequently, he is always attuned to ideational and social changes that foretell the next wave of development.”
Rest in Peace William Lim Siew Wai - thank you for making Singapore a better place.?
My co-author of EVERYDAY MODERNISM Justin Zhuang has written a concise biography of William Lim here:
Here are two TODAY articles on William Lim you may want to check out:
Independent researcher | Freelance EFL teacher | Heritage enthusiast
2 年Thank you for sharing! I was very fortunate to go on a group tour of the Golden Mile Complex led by him about 15 years ago. And like you said, I was also “in awe of being in his presence.”
Executive Fellow, Centre for Liveable Cities, former CEO National Heritage Board and National Gallery, Urban planner and designer
2 年Thanks very much Darren for your touching eulogy.