Architecture has the ability to inspire as well as transform the way we look at the wider world. For luxury living magazines, this often translates into sprawling getaways in faraway climes, but it also includes transformative public spaces that blend traditional notions of architecture with a new vision for living moving forward.
Indeed, most luxury lifestyle magazines aspire to identify emerging trends in lifestyle and architecture, and the combination of eco-friendly spaces with dynamic, awe-inspiring design is just the latest manifestation of the need to go green but in a way that is tasteful, elegant, and with an eye towards elevating one’s surroundings. That’s why luxury lifestyle publications can’t get enough of Singapore’s absolutely astonishing Jewel Changi Airport, a massive space that combines the best in innovative modern architecture with an ambiance and functional public space design.
Designed by architect Moshe Safdie, Jewel Changi Airport elevates the mundane with a mixed-use concept that takes that space that would be occupied by a massive airport parking lot and transforming it into a tourist destination in its own right. Combining eateries, shopping outlets, and the airport space itself, Jewel Changi Airport’s main attraction is its extensive use of green space and live plants to highlight and accentuate the experience. With over 10,000 palms and 100,000 shrubs, the massive and cavernous interior space is meant to give credence to Singapore’s calling card as the “city in a garden.” Traced throughout are pedestrian paths and a rooftop netting that lets visitors literally walk among the clouds.
The overall effect is to transport the visitor from the heart of a major world city to a tropical paradise, far removed from the concerns of the hustle and bustle of city life. Lining all of this are shops and boutique experiences that emphasize Jewel Changi Airport as a must-see destination for tourists but also as a welcoming, even inviting, space for locals in Singapore itself. The combined effort makes Jewel Changi Airport an experience in and of itself, and in that the designers have succeeded immensely.
Occupying ten full floors, with five underground and five above, the Jewel is topped with steel vertices that culminate in the HSBC Rain Vortex, a massive circular water fountain pouring down the middle of the structure. Forty feet tall measuring from the oculus to the ground, the waterfall takes the crown as the world’s tallest. At night, the waterfall is accented with lights in a dazzling display of lighting design and performance. One of the many epic pieces of architecture to grace Singapore in the past decade, Jewel Changi Airport also gives us a glimpse of the future of architecture and eco-aware design. It also demonstrates that large spaces need not be mundane and that even an airport terminal can be transformed into a tourist attraction with enough design acumen and forethought.
