A passion for great Asian cities and green architecture is putting British-Malaysian architect Jason Pomeroy at the forefront of a mission to balance sustainability and culture, writes Karen Ho
“MR BEAN or Phua Chua Kang?” I ask Professor Jason Pomeroy, the Singapore-based, half-Brit, half-Malaysian architect, who is also an urban planner, author and award-winner.
His reply, like most of his replies during the course of the interview, is conveyed with cool clarity and cultural observation.
“Mr Bean,” Pomeroy answers, without hesitation. “His humour transcends global societies. Phua Chu Kang is just for a minority. With Mr Bean, a French or Mongolian can understand his visual humour.”
With his charming English gent demeanour, coupled with a northwest London accent and a preppy sense of style, the youthful-looking Pomeroy can probably engage a lecture hall or a conference with ease, thanks to his knack for making weighty topics a little lighter and easier to digest. Imagine tackling a combination of history, architecture, travel, tradition and culture, and presenting it in a way that appeals to a wider audience.
INTRIGUING CITIES
This eloquent eco-architect does just that when he hosts the TV series City Time Traveller which airs on Singapore’s Channel News Asia. Conceived by Pomeroy jointly with a TV producer, the architecture-driven travel show has taken him and viewers around some of Asia’s most intriguing cities to uncover how architecture plays an important role in a city’s past, present and future.
“Few physical features can link a nation’s history, culture and tradition like its buildings,” shares the 41-year-old. So in each episode, he discovers a city’s story, explains the relevance of its edifices and gleans insights from local experts, all through his own expert viewpoint as a practising architect and academic. As both host and consultant, he’s able to be very involved, enabling him to inject spontaneity into his interviews or decide which part of a building to film.
Pomeroy must have done a better than average job, as it led to a second season.
This time round, his travels bring him to explore unique buildings such as the fortress monasteries of Paro, Bhutan, and the well-known skylines of Shanghai, and even our beloved multi-faceted capital city. In the latter episode, he delves into the history of landmarks such as the Sultan Abdul Samad Building, National Mosque, Menara Mesiniaga and Petronas Twin Towers.
Pomeroy summarises Malaysia’s architectural identity succinctly: “The period in which they (these buildings) were executed tells a tale of the country’s evolution: From a colonial settlement to post-independence nation building, to the rise of environmental consciousness and the quest for modernity balanced with Islamic undertones.”
It’s rather apt that I find myself interviewing the City Time Traveller in the beautiful confines of Hotel Majestic, KL, another illustrious structure rich in heritage and architectural character.
In addition to a first degree and postgraduate degree from the Canterbury School of Architecture, I discover that Pomeroy also earned a master’s degree with distinction from Cambridge University, graduating in the top five per cent of the country. He has written academic papers and authored a few books on architectural topics close to his heart, with another book in progress. He is a special professor at the University of Nottingham in England and teaches at another university in Venice, Italy. A few years ago, he established his firm in Singapore, Pomeroy Studio, which specialises in sustainable architecture.
Last year, he received the BCA-SGBC 2014 Young Green Advocate Award, a Singaporean accolade.
SUCCESS WITH SUSTAINABILITY
Pomeroy is a man with a green mission, one that grew roots during his university days. Based on all his work ventures, he is on a mission to propagate the practice of sustainable design in architecture that help reduce carbon footprints, while also seeking a balance between sustainability and culture. The concept is probably best illustrated in Pomeroy’s proudest achievement — the Idea House, the first zero-carbon house in Asia. Or to be specific, in Malaysia. Built in 2010, this is no ordinary home. It’s an energy-efficient prototype residence designed to generate enough energy from renewable sources to offset what is used by occupants. Drawing from the local culture, it reinterprets the traditional kampung house by embracing basic design features like optimising natural light and ventilation. The Idea House was also the subject of his first book.
“The reason for writing books, giving lectures at universities, writing commentaries. is all about sharing my knowledge on sustainable design,” confides Pomeroy. “Friends, family and people in the industry said I should try TV, it being a broader medium to convey a message to the masses.”
That combination of sustainability and culture became a winning formula for the ambitious architect and it is the signature of Pomeroy Studio today. As he explains further, I catch words like computational floor dynamics and spatial sustainability while he waxes lyrical about his studio’s design approach, E-BISD, an acronym for Evidence-Based Interdisciplinary Sustainable Design.
Thankfully the good professor is able to explain it using a simple analogy: “You see a doctor about a headache. The doctor could say he agrees that it’s a headache and gives you some paracetamol. That’s not really a diagnosis. You’d expect the doctor to use the element of diagnosis to find out if there’s something wrong other than a headache. That evidence-based element that separates a doctor from a quack — it’s important, post-financial crisis, for everybody to substantiate their actions.”
EARLY INFLUENCES
It’s not surprising that an early interest in architecture and in the built environment was formed in Pomeroy, since growing up in London meant he had access to eye-opening places in a culturally-rich city. Marvelling at the design of St Paul’s Cathedral when he was just 8 years old. Visiting theatres and galleries on weekends. Inventing names for dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum.
It was his Malaysian mother, a nurse, who had a big influence on him, “purely because she was very much into the cultural arts, meaning it was about literature, theatre, art and architecture, and those things seemed to resonate with me when she’d take me to these various places”. His career path may well have been sealed before puberty.
His parents believed in giving their only child a rounded education so Pomeroy reaped the benefits of having a mother who was a purveyor of the arts and an engineer father who encouraged him in sports and travel.
It’s no surprise then that when asked to recommend must-visit cities for their architecture, his two top choices included London. The other is Venice in Italy. It was a centre of trade and commerce for over 500 years and therefore saw merchants from Asia, Europe and the Middle East converging there and influencing the place.
“What’s left is this urban museum of nostalgia,” says Pomeroy, “where people try to almost recreate some of those cultural patterns of the past. That blending of culture, art and architecture that’s been fused by so many different cultures, based on trade and commerce, and for the fact that it’s a floating city, make it truly remarkable.”
In fact, he cites Venice as one of his guilty pleasures when he manages to squeeze in that elusive leisure time.
“Because I have little time, I have to find pockets. So Saturday morning is spent reading the Financial Times. A Friday night with a DVD. Then twice a year to Venice and, because I’m in Venice, I fly via London and that’s when I have that time with my mother. I’m very lean with my time but I get the most out of it.”
It’s hard to imagine Pomeroy ever being able to chill out for a few hours for a laid-back chat over afternoon coffee but there’s always a price to pay for pursuing those big goals.
He seems to have passed the course on Theories Of Juggling Time and definitely excelled in The Art Of Being Career-driven and Sharing Knowledge but he may need extra homework for the course on Stop And Smell The Roses. Homework that could also include watching a few more episodes of Mr Bean.