Photographic and printed material, Central Area Redevelopment Plan for Penang (KOMTAR) (1962-1986), George Town, Malaysia 馬來西亞喬治市檳城中央區域重建計劃（光大大廈）（1962至1986年）影像及印刷資料

The Singapore-based practice Architects Team 3 realised the Kompleks Tun Abdul Razak (KOMTAR), a sixty-five-storey structure in Penang, Malaysia, from 1972 to 1984. The project was named for Malaysia’s second prime minister, Abdul Razak Hussein, known as the ‘Father of Development’ for his catalytic role in the country’s economic growth.

Located in the historic George Town area, the project was part of a wider intervention identifying urban fabric for either conservation or rebuilding into a new civic centre. Its twelve-sided tower, whose corners are marked by thick circular concrete columns, houses state government offices. A sprawling four-storey base accommodates retail and transportation, forming an eleven-hectare city-within-a-city; a dome emerging from the podium’s roof covers a multi-use convention space whose geodesic form was realised in collaboration with the American designer Buckminster Fuller, a friend of Architects Team 3 co-founder Lim Chong Keat.

Due to inconsistent government support, only three of KOMTAR’s planned phases were completed. Nevertheless, the project is a landmark of Penang and a vestige of the state’s once forward-looking projection of its future.

The series consists of a set of slides containing a presentation on the project proposal, a photograph of an architectural model of the complex, and a brochure for prospective tenants.