Creative Weekly: August BTO Projects, Game-changing Spirit Storage, Art Inspired by Local Stories

In this creative weekly, we cover HDB’s August BTO launch, an eco-friendly way to store spirits and an arts campaign inspired by Singapore literature.

August BTO Sales Launch

Close to 8,000 BTO units across eight estates were put on sale this month. Despite the large number of units available compared to previous exercises, the flats were oversubscribed just one day into the sale period.

Some BTO project logos highlight features which make each of them unique - Parc Residences @ Tengah’s curved rooflines, Bishan Towers’ sky terraces and UrbanVille @ Woodlands’ skybridge.

Others just take cues from the project’s name, resulting in fairly uninspiring logos. Cliche word-graphic pairings made some logos worse than if they were just wordmarks - Tampines GreenGlade’s logo would look less amateurish without the leaf.

Facade-wise, Parc Residences @ Tengah offers the most interesting look with bright orange curved rooflines extending right to the ground floor. The project’s location in Singapore’s first car-lite town also means it is a testbed for new green technologies, including a centralised cooling system which successful BTO applicants can opt in for.

Meanwhile, UrbanVille @ Woodlands’ design more closely resembles a condominium than a BTO. Its two main blocks look majestic and are set to become the focal point of Woodlands’ town centre.

EcoTOTEs Elimitate Waste while Preserving Brand Elements

Proof & Company might just have created groundbreaking solution to ending single-use glass in the bar industry. Under their ecoSPIRITS distribution system, bars have the opportunity to reduce packaging and transport costs, thereby reducing their carbon footprint.

At the centre of ecoSPIRITS is the ecoTOTE, a reusable glass vessel which can be refilled up to 40 times before being sent for sanitisation. The lime-green vessels look like mini-fridges and the matte finish makes them look sophisticated. Vessels can also be labelled, ensuring as consistent a brand experience as possible for spirit makers.

To date, several well-known homegrown brands have already joined the ecoSPIRITS, including The Long Bar of Raffles Hotel and Brass Lion Distillery. If it is good enough for the Singapore Sling, quality is surely preserved in these ecoTOTEs.

Illustrate Local Lit

Singapore’s lockdown may be over but many are still working from home. If you have been using the same virtual background in Zoom calls and want to switch things up, consider choosing from this series of SingLit-inspired illustrations.

Eight backgrounds which range from natural sceneries to heritage architecture were created by local artists as part of BuySingLit’s National Day celebrations. The backgrounds do not scream “Majulah Singapura” like in NDP graphics, but are nuanced in celebrating Singapore’s creative side - perfectly fine to use even after August.

Anngee Neo’s minimalist crane and crab illustration would bring zen to your meetings, while cat lovers would love Marie Toh’s illustration of an old lady feeding a stray cat at a HDB void deck - it is wholesome and uniquely Singaporean. Visit SingLit’s Facebook page to find out more about each illustrator’s process in creating their virtual backgrounds.

The microsite also gives ample recognition to both the artists and the local book authors which inspired them, with links to their respective portfolios. Come for the art, stay for the book recommendations.

Bonus: Food Styling takes Meticulousness to New Heights

As part of a video series on unconventional jobs, Channel 8 featured Almanda Haley Teo of Alinea Collective, a self-taught food stylist of five years. You have probably seen her food art before on advertisements of food industry heavyweights Pizza Hut and Din Tai Fung.

The Channel 8 feature dives deep into her repurposed equipment used to beautify food, which include cotton buds to soak up oil and irons to create water droplets on steamboat pots. Tweezers are perhaps her most important tool, which she uses to painstakingly place each pizza topping for it to appear natural (the irony). Even if you do not understand the Mandrain, watching the ‘surgery’ it takes to get a professional food shot would make you appreciate food advertisements more.

Teo says it takes at least 10 hours to wrap up a shoot. With this level of detail, I am not surprised - I just hope she does not style while on an empty stomach!

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Creative Weekly is a roundup of local news stories from a design angle. Explore Singapore’s design scene with us on Facebook and Instagram.