Blog: Singapore Supertrees in the Marina South Gardens

Photo: Gustavo Ribeiro.This summer we visited Marina South Gardens, which were inaugurated on 29th July 2012. Marina South Gardens represent Singapore's latest, and possibly most ambitious economic and political investment, designed to promote Singapore's green profile and its extensive investment in clean-tech.

The park covers a 54-hectare area adjacent to Moshe Safdie's spectacular Marina Bay Sands Integrated Resort, and is equally bold in its architecture and landscape design.

Supertrees. Photo: Gustavo Ribeiro.Marina South Gardens were designed by the UK landscape architecture practice Grant Associates in collaboration with Wilkinson Eyre Architects, as part of the ambitious "Gardens By The Bay" project.

This project integrates architecture, landscape design and green technology in a highly innovative way.

Supertrees is a notable example of this innovation -- 18 vertical structures of reinforced concrete and steel, reaching to between 25 and 50 meters in height.

Cooled Conservatories at the Marina South Gardens. Photo: Gustavo Ribeiro. The Supertrees are both sculptural landscape elements and environmental machines. The reinforced concrete core of the trees acts as a water-capturing device, and is surrounded by a steel structure. This outer skin supports planting panels, and will create a vast green canopy, which will help to lower the temperature and provide shade.

The Supertrees combine a variety of green technologies (solar panels, air ventilation towers, and a rainwater collection system) and contribute to at least 30% saving in energy consumption in the Marina South Gardens' cooled conservatories.  

The two shell-shaped cooled conservatories, constructed in steel and glass, provide a spectacular framework for recreating the specific climatic conditions of other regions around the world, such as the cool-dry climate of the Mediterranean, or the cool-moist climate of South America's tropical mountain regions.

Marina South Gardens stand as optimistic icons of green technology and sustainable urban development.

Photo: Gustavo Ribeiro.

Master plan and landscape architecture: Grant Associates
Architects: Wilkinson Eyre Architects
Completion: 29th of 2012
Location: Singapore
Client: National Parks Board Singapore
Project's official website: www.gardensbythebay.org.sg