Chloe Tam
Architecture MA
Royal College of Art
Specialisms: Architecture / Design Research / Digital / Visual Comm / Film
Location: London, United Kingdom
Chloe Tam
First Name: Chloe
Last Name: Tam
Specialisms: Architecture / Design Research / Digital / Visual Comm / Film
Sectors:
My Location: London, United Kingdom
University / College: Royal College of Art
Course / Program Title: Architecture MA
About
Chloe’s spatial interests are places of curiosity and exploration, and is constantly questioning the relationship between senses, memory, identity, and temporality.
Her first-year project at the RCA: “From Homo Sapiens to Homo Ludens: Unscripting Architecture” proposes a spatial and programmatic strategy for the transformation of a large-scale mono-functional stadium into a multi-generational playscape in Hong Kong. Her thesis project "Musicking Impermanence" explores the use of soundscape as a design methodology, to approach the taboo around passing and mourning.
Chloe completed her undergraduate degree in Architecture at the University of Hong Kong (2019) and has worked as an architectural designer in P&T Group and Shigeru Ban Architects in Tokyo. Her final year project, ‘Flux in Málaga,’ was exhibited at IE Design Excellence Exhibition during her exchange semester in Segovia, Spain.
Musicking impermanence
Chloe’s project takes the Cantonese ‘Ballad of Sighs’ as an entry point, to explore the maritime history of Hong Kong through the lens of a nomadic group of fishermen. A city known for its past as a fishing village, Ballads of Sighs carries stories about the sea’s scenery, the variety of fishes; stories about life & death, through tones that alternate in repetition, synchronising with the ocean waves. Unique to the sea dwellers, this genre of music is passed down from one generation to the next, but as fewer follow the ancestral path of fishermen, the music finds fewer and fewer listeners today. From Sampan (fishing boat dwellings), and shipyard factories, to typhoon shelters; Chloe seeks ways to connect, revisit and reactivate pieces of the fading history and culture of the city. Chloe explores sea burial as a more environmentally-conscious alternative to traditional burial methods, as well as a way of honouring the natural cycles of life and death, where all living things eventually return to nature. The ritual walk through her architecture gathers a community of listeners, whose togetherness provides a space of mourning, remembrance and healing.
Competitions
