Comments from Gesa Buttner (Designer at Gehry Partners, LLP)

Sernhong,

I have looked at the pdf. I think the direction is very promising but 
needs some structuring. Each sheet shows an array of possibilities. 
Your job is now to zoom in and focus, make your argument stronger, more
 
polemic (if that is your intention). Read below for some of the ideas 
and questions that came up while reviewing your drawings.

Playing with the past and using it as guideline for possible 
developments is an interesting topic. You turn it upside down, instead 
of history you look for the inherent fiction of the city, the pasts 
untold. You extract the relevant elements by "copying" them into 
today's context. You use the past to diversify the present, by 
reintroducing rejected ideas you bring the city again into a critical 
situation in which different scenarios become valid. This forces 
society, politics and business alike to reevaluate the future. Instead 
of an inflexible monooriented planning approach based on the assumption
of continuous groth and control, you develop a matrix of possible 
scenarios that show how the city could prosper and survive even under 
the worst conditions. Your pirates are synonyms for these worst 
conditions, overcome in the past but not resolved forever.
I'm guessing all the above and would love to see something that 
sustains this argument. I see bits and pieces of it all over your 
presentation, you just have to put them together in a densified format.
 
I think you should not anything to your thesis, reduce instead and 
filter the strong points. I.e. I did not understand your pirate matrix 
at all - and this should be one of your strongest sheets. You are the 
insider of Singapore and everybody in the Jury will be dying to get 
some first hand information from you that they don't know from the 
media. The matrix could present all of this untold insider knowledge. I
recommend that you explain the idea of the pirates in more detail. What
is pirate? A player? Or an action?

Timeline: What is worth copying from the past? Name it. What were the 
keystones in Singapore's development were history and the city could 
have taken a different turn? I.e. No independence vs independence, No 
land-gain vs land gain. How about a graphic, that shows these moments 
as a timeline and and a spreadsheet that traces other possible 
combinations/ fast-forwards a missed possible future into the present.

Project: Explain the drivers that created this tentacle. What was the 
architect's leverage that you are mentioning? Why do we need an 
architect? I would prefer it if the design was an outcome of all your 
spreadsheets instead of being intentional. You need to package it, 
brand it more!

Keep going!
I truly believe this could be marvelous.
When is your presentation?

Good luck

Gesa