Singapore
In Singapore, where seemingly innocuous gum chewing is prosecutable, a nightclub with an explicit drug theme seems impossible. But after locals shook off the initial stun, they now escape in droves to The Clinic, a macabre, hospital-themed playground designed by Amsterdam-based architect Concrete that taps into the city’s work-hard-play-harder culture. The concept of this 6-month-old venue: a labyrinth of 13 pill-shaped rooms, each illuminated in distinct ways to heighten that room’s particular theme or “side effect,” as the architects put it.
![The Clinic at Clarke Quay Singapore](/ext/resources/Issues/Archives/Projects/2007/0705_singaporeclinic.jpg)
The 15,000-square-foot interior is divided in two: the ground-floor bars and dance club, featuring spaces named after medicines, and the upstairs VIP lounges and restaurants, named after states of mind. The lighting, too, offers multiple layers of experience. For the club’s main space, a 730-square-foot capsule-shaped dance floor called Morphine, Concrete called in local lighting designer Jesmend Tham, principal of avoKinetix, to design a truss-system lighting rig based on Concrete’s specifications. The rig is suspended from the upstairs Delirium lounge, which forms a mezzanine above Morphine. Following Concrete’s suggestion for simplicity, Tham ringed the armature with adjustable-focus fresnel luminaires, bathing the seating of Delirium as well as the Morphine dance floor in warm halogen light.
Morphine’s main event is a massive arch lined with computer-controlled LEDs. The denseness of the LED surface—the diodes are spaced 1 centimeter apart in a grid—produces a video-like effect. Tham and Lee created the imagery for the screens, a rotating program that includes creepy Big Brother eyeballs that canvass the dance floor, and trickles of blood that eventually “drip” down the sides of the arch. The LEDs are dimmed to 50 percent “to make it a little bit more sexy,” Angevaare says.
PeopleArchitect: Concrete Architectural Associates Rozengracht 133 III 1016 1v Amsterdam the Netherlands ph: +31 (0)20 5200200 Project team: Rob Wagemans, Joris Angevaare, Erik van Dillen, Melanie Knuwer, Onne Walsmit, Ulrike Lehner
Owner: Lifebranz #04-12 Regency House 123 Penang Road Singapore 238465 ph:+65 67666280 fx:+65 67333910
Lighting Designer: avoKinetix 64 Po Huat Crescent Singapore 5468967 Ph: +65 9794 3238 Principal: Jesmend Tham
General Contractor: Grandwork Interior Pte Ltd George Tan, senior project manager 4 Ang Mo Kio Ave 12 Industrial Park 2 Singapore 569498 ph: +65 67327320
Sound Desinger: Pure Fusion Systems Austen Derek, principal ph: 917.559.9388
Photographer: Sash Alexander
architecture — Jean-François
Milou, lead architect; Wenmin Ho,
Thomas Rouyrre, architectural
team managers; Charmaine Boh,
Janis Goh, Trung Thanh Nguyen,
Jason Tan, Jiarong Goh, May Leong,
Eudora Tan, architectural designers
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ProductsSources: Morphine/Delirium Lighting rig: Martin Electronic Theatre Controls
Aurum: Martin
Phobia Chandelier: Moooi
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