Papers by Author: Nurhananie Spalie

Abstract: Malaysia is one of the classic examples of a multi-ethnic society. The country is proud of its multiracial culture which makes it a model for other countries. The ubiquitous community hall in the Malaysian landscape, as it stands now, has long passed its time of usefulness. These halls are labelled with names like dewan serbaguna, dewan orang ramai or even balai raya. But as it stands today, the community hall in our midst is nothing more than a large empty space used for games like badminton or ping pong and the occa-sional event. The changing modern Malaysian society demands more of this simple out-dated facility; there must be a place for the various ethnic groups to meet and fulfil modern needs such as family days, health checks, child’s play, music lessons and many more important uses This paper strives to identify and analyse some of the architectural problems in current community centres in Malaysia with the focus on the spatial aspects and space usage. It is expected that this paper can give a clear picture of the problems faced by Malaysian community centres with some considerations and a framework to develop a new scheme for community centre development in the future.

Abstract: The ubiquitous terrace house is undeniably the most popular and affordable housing type in Malaysia. It has long been considered as one of the densest forms of property development and has become the common typology of accommodating the masses for this country. However, in Malaysia (like other third world countries), the design of a house has never grow from novelistic idea of style and revivalism. As stated by Tajuddin Rasdi (2003), housing in Malaysia has been plague with various issues for decades. We are currently living separate and individual lives in the sea of congested modern housing and we will be forever plagued by the mercy of crime, climate, cultural tensions and threats from accidents. For the last 50 years it has never grown to create the idea of community and fulfill the true need of a family with its culture and context called ‘Malaysia’. Based on our paper N. Utaberta (2009), we have identified the ability of traditional Malay house to grow and transform based on the need and interest of one family. This paper tries to study and evaluate the flexibility of a low rise house in Malaysia. It will explore some design and construction framework based on the flexibility of our traditional (timber) Malay house of growing and transformable house.