OCBC Centre
Singapore · 1976
Photo · Photo by Shang Wei Kouo
A key precedent for structural expressionism and Brutalist high-rise design, demonstrating how massive concrete cores can flank and support suspended, gridded office volumes.
- What we like about this project
- The office windows are grouped into three distinct suspended pods rather than a continuous curtain wall.
Materials
- concrete
- textured-plaster
- glass
- steel
Visual identifiers
- brutalist-tower
- concrete-cores
- cantilevered-blocks
- gridded-facade
Style tags
- brutalist
- late-modernist
- structural-expressionist
Visual tags
- brutalist
- structural-expressionism
- high-rise
- monolithic
- urban-landmark
- Geometry
- The tower is composed of two massive, semi-circular concrete service cores flanking three distinct, cantilevered office blocks. Each block features a grid of deeply recessed windows.
- Facade system
- Precast concrete window units recessed within a structural frame.
- Structural guess
- Reinforced concrete core-and-cantilever system
- Spatial scale
- A monumental high-rise tower of over fifty stories, dominating the surrounding urban fabric.
- Lighting
- Bright, direct daylight casting soft shadows within the window recesses and highlighting the curved profile of the concrete core.
- Atmosphere
- A powerful, monumental presence rising cleanly into a bright sky.
- Environmental context
- Set within an urban skyline, framed by classical stone columns in the foreground and other mid-to-high-rise structures in the distance.
- Spatial experience
- The building reads as a monumental, sculptural vertical mass. The contrast between the smooth, solid concrete cores and the highly textured, gridded office volumes creates a powerful sense of structural expression.
- Composition rhythm
- Three stacked, identical office modules separated by structural transition zones, balanced by the continuous verticality of the side cores.
- Style reading
- Late Modernist Brutalism
- Program
- Commercial office headquarters
- Perspective
- Exterior Facade
- Discipline
- architecture
- Materials
- concrete, textured-plaster, glass, steel
- Visual identifiers
- brutalist-tower, concrete-cores, cantilevered-blocks, gridded-facade
- Style tags
- brutalist, late-modernist, structural-expressionist
- Visual tags
- brutalist, structural-expressionism, high-rise, monolithic, urban-landmark
- Geometry
- The tower is composed of two massive, semi-circular concrete service cores flanking three distinct, cantilevered office blocks. Each block features a grid of deeply recessed windows.
- Facade system
- Precast concrete window units recessed within a structural frame.
- Structural guess
- Reinforced concrete core-and-cantilever system
- Spatial scale
- A monumental high-rise tower of over fifty stories, dominating the surrounding urban fabric.
- Lighting
- Bright, direct daylight casting soft shadows within the window recesses and highlighting the curved profile of the concrete core.
- Atmosphere
- A powerful, monumental presence rising cleanly into a bright sky.
- Environmental context
- Set within an urban skyline, framed by classical stone columns in the foreground and other mid-to-high-rise structures in the distance.
- Spatial experience
- The building reads as a monumental, sculptural vertical mass. The contrast between the smooth, solid concrete cores and the highly textured, gridded office volumes creates a powerful sense of structural expression.
- Composition rhythm
- Three stacked, identical office modules separated by structural transition zones, balanced by the continuous verticality of the side cores.
- Style reading
- Late Modernist Brutalism
- Program
- Commercial office headquarters
- Perspective
- Exterior Facade
- Discipline
- architecture