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Hi, I am Vincent Kiew from Malaysia. Here is a unique heritage house in our country. I would like to specially explain the history of this LEGO house and my objective of designing it. Hopefully through this, I am able to introduce this cultural heritage house to everyone. ... This type of houses was found way back to end of 19th century before Malaya was formed when we were a colony of British. During that time, houses were built from leaves and tree trunks. In 1882, the 3rdpolitical secretary, Frank A. Swettenham, was involved in rebuilding of the city which is the current capital of Malaysia. During this period, building materials were supplied by British businessmen, whereas, manpower was provided by Kapitan Yap Ah Loy. In 1884, the first four brick houses (next to the house of Yap Ah Loy) were completed. Following year, two hundred and eighteen of similar houses were built. During the same time, most of the wooden houses were destroyed by fire. As such, the colonial government encouraged the people to build brick houses. In 1889, colonial government ordered to demolish all the wooden houses. Since then, there was no more wooden house. Till today, the brick houses can still be found in the capital Kuala Lumpur, northern region in Penang, southern region in Melaka, central region in Ipoh and Muar. Different interior design was found in different region due to the influence of colonial background and the local customs. For example, colour of the brick houses found in Kuala Lumpur, was plain white. Northern region was influenced by the culture of Southern Thailand, whereas, southern region was influenced by the culture of Indonesia. As a result, they were more colourful. Although they all had difference colour, the design of the structure was more or less the same with the main door in the middle, one window on each side of the door. Second floor usually had two or three windows. There was carving on the walls. The significant feature of the houses was their shapes. They were all narrow but long. This feature was very much due to the housing taxes during that period. During that time, the housing taxes were very much depended on the width of the house, regardless of the length. As a result, the people built their houses narrow and long. Most occupants of these houses were the migrants of China. Exterior of the houses were an integration of western and eastern styles of essence. The columns and the wall in front of the houses had the carving of European design, but windows and main door were design of Asian influenced because of the tropical weather in this region. The interior design of the house was very much designed according to the nation of the occupants. If you are visiting Kuala Lumpur, pay attention to the houses in Street Petaling, you will be able to see a few of these houses. Although they are rundown, use your imagination to travel through times. (^-^)/ During World War II in 1939, most of the places in the capital of Malaysia were used as army base and many of the brick houses were destroyed. However, many were kept in good conditions in Penang and Melaka. One of the brick houses belonged to a family of Baba Nyonya located at Jalan Tung Cheng Lock in Melaka, was converted to a Baba & Nyonya Heritage Museum in 1985. In 2009, it was visited by the president of China Hu Jintao during his visit to Malaysia. If you have the interest in learning more about heritage, it should be one of the places you should visit. I am sure you will learn a lot about our ancestors. Back to this LEGO model, I had wanted to build a Malaysian house. In order to build a house using LEGO, the door and the roof must resemble the original design. The wall and interiors are similar to many housing designs. It took me a few trials to get the windows right. After some research and study on a few books I bought, I still didn’t have a clue. It was only until I saw an old photo of a house with an open window on the second floor one day, then only I saw the structure of the window. The photo was a picture of people celebrating independent day at the Street Petaling. At that moment, all I wanted was to go home and build the windows (-_^). Besides the windows, another difficult structure to build was the air well. I wanted to know how to build the support of the air well. I wanted to know if there was a door and where was the drainage. It was at this time, when I took my children to Legoland during school holiday, I stopped at the Baba & Nyonya Heritage Museum in Melaka to study its structure. Even though the LEGO house that I built was based on the housing design in Kuala Lumpur, the interior decoration and furniture all resembled what was used by Chinese. For example, the red colour bed and the kitchen design were inspired by my visit to the Baba & Nyonya Heritage Museum. Thanks to the museum. Sharing you all my little Lego video. Check it out at the following link. https://vimeo.com/173026760 Hope you all like my works. ^_^ 1 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 1 (1) by vincentkiew, on Flickr 5 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 10 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 12 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 15 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 17 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 22 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 28 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 29 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 37 by vincentkiew, on Flickr 39 by vincentkiew, on Flickr
