@Andie:yups there are certainly plenty that we could learn from the past, but they need rethinking as well, because things are changing now; climate had become more severe, money had gained more power and architect has not yet being regarded as their profession responsibilities.

@Prananda: we are in such bad condition, but we can make a difference by believing that the system in our government will walk for a better course.

@Akhmad: thanks for your comment.

but there are too many mistakes was made here with the buildings and infrastructures, like flood and earthquake. why people here didn’t even learn from the past?

Think about it; the colonial architecture that we see on our urban scape today is best suited to our climate (as far as I remember I have never complained about the temperature whenever I set foot in a colonial structure even though the air outside is as humid and hot as hell would probably be, and the building has no air-conditioning whatsoever.

My point here is, that there’s a lot we can learn from these heritage structures; thick walls, high ceilings, ventilated roofs, and all other building engineering stuffs. Remember, architecture does not only function as container of activities, but also as climate modifier. What’s the use of talking about sustainability and eco-friendly architecture when we still use air-conds in the new buildings that we introduce to our urban scape(at least to the scale of housing and other low-rise buildings)?

If you still ask about identities, well, why don’t we return to our traditional forms of architecture? Why not make “Taman Joglo” or “Rumah Gadang” instead of 1:1 copies of other places in the world (”Singapore in Surabaya”, “A taste of Paris on the West-side”, etc.)? We can combine these traditional structures with ‘colonial building engineering’…I’m sure that we can achieve absolutely magnificent results

BTW, how come I can’t log-in???