Sculpting Spaces in the Tropics

The collection of homes represents the journey of an architect designing houses in the tropics. Sculptural forms allow the owners of these homes to enjoy a sustainable, tropical style of living. Each home integrates elements of the outdoors, and Aamer addresses light and shade with designs that feature openness to the landscape. His earlier works included relate a body of work that incorporates lush gardens into an indoor living experience. His inspirations are often drawn from traditional Asian culture – homes that are bold in form and fluid in function. Aamer’s design process incorporates location, culture, climate, and structure to create homes that arrive at an aesthetic whole.

Aamer re-invents the tropical house with contemporary forms that are unique and relevant to today’s lifestyle expectations. Tropical elements of light and shade, openness to the landscape are revisited with interesting new forms. Merging the tropical language with contemporary lines and structure, the book shows also the earlier works of Aamer which already embrace the green lush outdoor gardens making them part of the indoor living experience. Inspirations are often drawn from the traditional Asian culture like from the Iban Longhouse which resulted in the “Dalvey Long House”, bold in form and fluid in function with its typical spatial arrangements and strategy. Other projects derive their challenges from the site, like the “Merlimau House” built on a rather tight triangular land. Apart from cooling the house by having ‘green roof tops’ the effect can be achieved by having the swimming pool elevated – where the best views sometimes are.

Sculpting Spaces in the Tropics attempts to show that Aamer views design as finding an ideal solution to the combination of factors that include site, culture and climate, structure and services with an economy of means to arrive at an aesthetic whole. The Archisculpture architecture considers each project as a work of art, conceived through a thorough appreciation of context and brief, and carefully sculptured to congenially fit into the land.