(Recording of choral performance by Voices of Singapore at Temasek Shophouse. Photo credit: Voices of Singapore)

Temasek Shophouse (TSH) carefully began to open its doors to the public again this year through a series of organised events. Amidst the uncertainties, we experienced successes as well as struggles coordinating operations on the ground and offsite while abiding by restrictions. They were no easy feat, and a poignant reminder of the importance of physical events; face-to-face interactions with old friends and networking to make new friends. Despite the challenges, we strived to stay positive and approach this challenge as an opportunity to expand our creativity and capability in community-building in a pandemic season.

This year’s highlights at TSH include collaboration with organisers from Post-Museum and Visual Artist Veronyka Lau launching the second edition of Renew Earth Sweat Shop (RESS), a recorded choral performance by Voices of Singapore (VOS) and IDE Academy’s Youth Invention Sprint Workshops for the next generation of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) leaders.

A participatory art project for the community, RESS was first launched in 2020 with environmental and labour concerns about the global fashion industry in mind. The second edition launched in 2021 focused on reducing fashion waste. The 4-month programme started in May 2021 with Ideation Workshops on recycling trash into fashion, also known as “trashion”. More than 80 people gathered virtually and in small groups to experiment fashion deconstruction of discarded items into new designs that were displayed in a pop-up showcase at TSH from 30 August to 31 October. By creating micro-community spaces at TSH for people to gather to learn, to sew and upcycle together, the project hopes to galvanise our community to confront the issue of fashion waste and bring about meaningful changes collectively.

In support of World Mental Health Day 2021, TSHand Voices of Singapore presented a special choral performance that seeks to raise awareness for mental health issues. With an uplifting medley of carefully selected songs, we hope that it brings cheer and provides comfort to the community in challenging times. Led by critically acclaimed Composer-Conductor Darius Lim who is also the Founder of VOS, the performance featured 3 songs: May It Be (From Lord of the Rings), Night of Rainbows, and a medley of Xi Shui Chang Liu (细水长流) and Xiao Ren Wu De Xin Sheng (小人物的心 声). The recorded performance can be found on Temasek Shophouse’s Facebook page. VOS Children’s Choir hopes to use the power of their voices through music and singing to promote awareness about mental health, to bring healing, positivity and optimism as we march towards brighter days ahead.

During this coming year end school holidays, Temasek Shophouse & IDE Academy will be collaborating to host 6 Youth Invention Sprint workshops for students aged between 11 to 18 years old to design solutions to real-world problems impacting us. Aside from preparing students for the future, this initiative also aims to encourage a spirit of active citizenry among the participants, raise awareness on pressing social and environmental issues and foster a collaborative approach towards crafting solutions to meeting the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). Participants, nominated by their teacher or school, were invited to first identify real-world problems then ideate solutions using a 7-step invention process. In just 6 sessions, they were able to build and test prototypes of their ideas to experience the effectiveness of their solutions. A non-prototype showcase is also expected to be held at TSH in Jan 2022 to exhibit the works of the youths.

We anticipate more physical events taking place at TSH in 2022 as we look forward to the future with hope. Though the Covid-19 crisis was unprecedented, this disruption has been pivotal in shifting our mindsets towards how we build our future together against all odds. We are optimistic that through innovative ways, we can support a future community where no one gets left behind.