Supreme Court & City Hall

National Art Gallery Open House

Past, Present and Future

City Hall Building

• Designed by F D Meadows and completed in 1929
• Known as the Municipal Building until 1951
• Housed many offices of several government departments, including the office of Singapore's first Prime Minister, Mr Lee Kuan Yew.

Former Supreme Court

The Facts

• Built on the site of the Hotel L'Europe, one of the palatial hotels in Southeast Asia in the 1900s.
• Built at the cost of $1.75 million an said to be modelled after the Old Bailey Court House in London
• Declared open in 1939
• The Supreme Court moved to the new building, just a stone's throw away from the former site.
• The new Supreme Court was designed by Lord Norman Foster.

Foundation Stone

Laid by Sir Shenton Thomas on 1 April 1937, the 70th anniversary of the proclamation of the Straits Settlement as a separate colony. Being seven feet across and weighing two tonnes, it was the largest foundation stone in Malaya at that time. A time capsule, fashioned from brass and containing 6 Singapore newspapers and Straits Settlement coins from that period of time, slumbers under the stone. They will be unearthed in the year 3000, 900 years from now!

Holding Cell (Restricted Access)

Notorious murderers have sat here as they waited for their verdicts to be announced. There are 10 inmate holding cells reserved for men in the former Supreme Court, and 2 for women. The flushes for the toilets are located outside the cells, so that inmates could not harm themselves. In future, 2 of these cells will be kept in the future National Art Gallery as a reminder of what this place used to be.

Main Corridor

Built during the time of the Great Depression, the former Supreme Court suffered a lack of funding resources. You probably could not tell it from looking at the grad facade alone. Economical building materials were used and the inside of the building is rather austere and practical.

Gypsum plaster was used for the finishing of the cornices and the main hall. The rubber tiling on the floors of the main corridor reflect an Art Deco influence. Locally manufactured, they are sound-absorbing to make sure that the halls of the Supreme Court would remain suitably quiet.

Rotunda Library

Once upon a time, the rotunda library used to hold the law library. Then when the collection outgrew the circular space, the library was moved to the City Hall building, and this room was converted into a police post, back at a time when policemen were still wearing shorts!

Chief Justice's Chamber

The Chief Justice's chambers are served by their own private lift. The Y-shaped table you see in the Chief Justice's office is the only one in the building

On the bookshelves, you can see the emblems featuring arms of Inns of Court, a professional association which provides legal training, selection and regulation for every barrister in England and Wales. These will be conserved as testimonies to the building's former functions in the future Gallery.

Courtroom 1

One of the four original courtrooms in the former Supreme Court. The furniture in Courtroom 1 will be preserved in the National Art Gallery.

Even in the days before air-conditioning, judges, lawyers and spectators could keep cool when the heat was on. A ventilated system called the Solo-Air system, invented by E H Hindmarsh, provided a cooling current of renewed air routed through the floor and up into the legs of the tables, where concealed ducts directed jets of air.

The horizontal bar at the bottom is where the accused will be chained to.

The Marina bay Sands Hotel is becoming an iconic structure of the surrounding area.

Chief Justice Yong Pung How, the second of three local Chief Justices that Singapore has had, was the one who abolished the wearing of traditional wigs for the justices.

Supreme Court Balcony

The balcony is fronted by Ionic and Corinthian columns, belonging to two classical orders of Greek and Roman architecture. These columns are made of gypsum plaster, commonly known as Shanghai plaster, in reference to the skilled Chinese artisans who fled China during the Sino-Japanese war and came here to work.

Look up at the tympanum - the little triangular section over the columns. You can see the depiction of Justice here is not blindfolded, as it usually is ( on the United States Supreme Court, for example). The sculptures were carved by Italian Cavalieri Rudolfo Nolli, who was also responsible for moulding the internal columns of the building.

Leaving my mark as remembrance of my visit.

See how my little red dot stood out from the crowd!

City Hall Steps

The City Hall steps and building have served as the backdrop for many national events. The surrender of the Japanese forces in 1942 was announced by Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten in these steps, as was then-PM Lee Kuan Yew's proclamation of self-government in 1959.