ABSTRACT
When the Department of Architecture and Building at the Singapore Polytechnic (SP) was founded in 1959, one of its stated objectives was to develop “within itself a core of a school of tropical architecture in which instruction [was] based on the requirements of tropical countries.”1 One of the first lectures that D. J. Vickery, the first head of the Department, gave was on “Climate and Architecture.”2 In late 1959, when Kee Yeap took over as the first local head of the Department, his ambition was to establish SP as the “centre for post-graduate work in designing buildings for the tropics.”3 Under his headship, the curriculum at SP continued to be “keyed to instruction, practice and theory of Architecture for the tropical regions, and of building constructional techniques applicable to the country.”4 From the very beginning, the teaching of building science was an integral part of the focus on tropical architecture.5 Indeed, the very first visiting professor appointed with the assistance of the Colombo Plan to the Department was a building scientist.6
