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Gardens by the Bay II

Squint/Opera

Discover a supernatural built environment and explore it as a dragonfly.


Gardens by the bay II is the second film created by Squint/Opera on behalf of Grant Associated, leading partner of a project team participating at the Singapore Bay International Design Competition. This second-stage video features a selected portion of the wider winning design. Since the very first scenes the virtual camera pans within the depths of an imaginative tropical garden, where all kind of flowers and plants (coming from different parts of the world) are budding while dragonflies fly by.

The original perspective chosen for the film projects a cinematic vision of the main elements of the architectural project. The dynamic framing let the audience discover in a scenographic manner the giant structures of the Supertrees - iconic vertical gardens made out of steel - and two of the largest climate-controlled conservatories in the world. Apart from the short initial bird's eye view over Marina Bay, the audience does not immediately perceive that this lush garden is integrated within the city: in a final coup de theater, the camera inside one of the cooled conservatory shows a final low-angle shot of the Supertrees with the city in the background.

Singapore Gardens by the bay are meant to be a national icon and a symbol of the country's architectural objectives as a promoter of the tropical garden city prototype. Therefore the communication of this ambitious project is an important part of the project itself, both during the competition and the succeeding advertising campaign to reach a wider audience. After the first film - the "competition film" (cit. Grant Ass.) - that attempts to explain the overall project, this second film is instead a seductive way to present the most spectacular structures of the South Garden to the future local and international visitors.

Credits

Architects: Grant Associates, Wilkinson Eyre Architects
Mentioned project: Gardens by the Bay (2012)
Project location: Singapore

United Kingdom 2008
Duration: 2'44''

First selected for VISIONS, the 2009 edition of BEYOND MEDIA Festival organized by Image.