A mansion in a kampung
I cannot remember exactly when a few years ago I was driven to a remote Malay kampung quite close to my kampung in Temerloh, Pahang, Malaysia where I was shown an abandoned mansion, overgrown with climbers and creepers. I remembered that the building was situated at the bank of a padi field. A beautiful location I thought, and what a waste. I was told that the building was built by a European who married a local Malay lady. The mansion was never finished when they moved to the big City, leaving the building or should I say abandoning the unfinished building. What caused them to leave is still a mystery.
After that I passed that way on other occasions in my evening drive when I am back in my kampung but I took little notice. I was interested but there was no one to ask and I dared not go into the building for fear of being accused to trespassing.
People said that the European built the mansion for the love of his wife, and they probably intended to stay there. The land area where the mansion is built, I am told, is about 2 acres. I am not sure how many rooms it has upstairs but I know that it has a hall downstairs, I found this out very much later. Near the downstairs hall are the servants rooms, the local folks says these were rooms underground. In the hall is a sort of ventilation hole, going up a chimney like structure, and the local call that ventilation hole as the fire place. The chimney like structure comes out of the roof like a proper chimney. Look closely at the photo and one can see the small chimney on top of the roof in the middle if the building.
And on both sides of the building there are arches, which the local say are for horse stable; but I believe that these are architectural beautifying structures which would look very beautiful if creepers are planted on them. Anyway the owner then never finished the building (or lived in it) so we can only speculate what those arches are for. And all the windows and pillars structures are in the form of arches.
As time goes by I forgot altogether about that building. Until about 1 month ago I was told that it was bought over by a young couple at a very low price. Low in the sense that it was well architectured and built and the building materials are of high quality. It being situated in a rural setting, in a kampung, was probably why it was sold for a quite a low price. But considering that its by the road side with all amenities available and on 2 acre of plot land, in my opinion its real bargain.
During the 2007 Chinese New Year holiday period in mid-February I decided to make a visit to the mansion, now that I have been told it has a new owner. I found that the owner has turned the building into a high quality furniture assembling and refurbishing workshop,
though he kept the main building intact, using its large hall downstairs as a storage space
and then building other storage buildings at the back or away from the main building.
These are where he stored all his material to be assembled and/or refurbished. He had taken the risk of buying over all the unassembled and unfurbished wooden furniture from a rubber wood furniture manufacturing factory in the industrial estate about 10 km away, buying over the whole stock and transferring all that into this new mansions premises and also into the storage spaces he built.
These specially made furniture are actually designed furniture which were originally for the export market.
On the closure of the manufacturing plant a couple of years ago, these furniture were then allowed to be sold locally. He now has only to assemble and refurbish these furniture and marketing them. That will be the new vision of the his young entrepreneur.
When I visited him he was busy planning for the marketing of these furniture. In addition he is also adding new product lines to complement what he already has. He has the people to help him and to date he says that he has got interested parties to purchase his products.
And as for the maintenance of the abandoned mansion which he has bought over, he has plans but this may not materialise unless he can market his products.
The mansion has a long history and this I shall make more research and will write more about it at a later date when I get all the facts in place.
What is of interest here is not the furniture assembling and refurbishing work but the mansion itself. Looking at the building, its all seems to be very symmetrical, whichever way you look at it. From left, from right, from front and from the back.
At a particular angle, one can see triangles and a pyramid.
Fascinating. I have not enough photographs here to show all these shapes, but if one cares to visit the site one can see how the builder played with the the symmetry of the building.
Why is it necessary for a building in the tropic to have chimney? Maybe the designer had something else in mind but since the building was never finished or never been lived in it by the designer we shall never know. Maybe just a ventilation hole.
The red coloured (or is it pink?) structure is the chimney which leads to the top of the roof.
And the hall at the basement of the building looks so grand. And the staircase connecting the back of the building to the upstairs, and also to and from the main hall, its beyond belief at the futuristic outlook of the designer.
The porch, was it meant to put cars in them or was it something else?
The arches on the two sides of the building, why were they built? We can only speculate, as I said above. And why all the arches all over the building?
The waterfall in the garden is simply made, probably on second thought. Its a give way, its not in symmetry with the building, its a foreign element from the design. Why was it created in the first place?
Coming back to the real world, the mansion is now owned, as far as I know, by En Mohamad Awik (hp 6019-9890468) who trades as M Tech Cabinet Centre and also as Gerbang Magna Enterprise. As I said earlier, he has bought over lock, stock and barrel of manufactured but not furbished or assembled chairs and table parts from a Company who used to operate a manufacturing plant at the nearby Songsang Industrial Estate. He says, on receiving orders he will furbish and assemble these furniture and transport them to any of his customer. He is also trading in other special wooden furniture, mostly hand made, and also in wooden wall paneling and wooden flooring. He has high hope for his business.
If Batu Gajah in Perak has Kelly's Castle, why can't Temerloh in Pahang have similar?.
After that I passed that way on other occasions in my evening drive when I am back in my kampung but I took little notice. I was interested but there was no one to ask and I dared not go into the building for fear of being accused to trespassing.
People said that the European built the mansion for the love of his wife, and they probably intended to stay there. The land area where the mansion is built, I am told, is about 2 acres. I am not sure how many rooms it has upstairs but I know that it has a hall downstairs, I found this out very much later. Near the downstairs hall are the servants rooms, the local folks says these were rooms underground. In the hall is a sort of ventilation hole, going up a chimney like structure, and the local call that ventilation hole as the fire place. The chimney like structure comes out of the roof like a proper chimney. Look closely at the photo and one can see the small chimney on top of the roof in the middle if the building.
And on both sides of the building there are arches, which the local say are for horse stable; but I believe that these are architectural beautifying structures which would look very beautiful if creepers are planted on them. Anyway the owner then never finished the building (or lived in it) so we can only speculate what those arches are for. And all the windows and pillars structures are in the form of arches.
As time goes by I forgot altogether about that building. Until about 1 month ago I was told that it was bought over by a young couple at a very low price. Low in the sense that it was well architectured and built and the building materials are of high quality. It being situated in a rural setting, in a kampung, was probably why it was sold for a quite a low price. But considering that its by the road side with all amenities available and on 2 acre of plot land, in my opinion its real bargain.
During the 2007 Chinese New Year holiday period in mid-February I decided to make a visit to the mansion, now that I have been told it has a new owner. I found that the owner has turned the building into a high quality furniture assembling and refurbishing workshop,
though he kept the main building intact, using its large hall downstairs as a storage space
and then building other storage buildings at the back or away from the main building.
These are where he stored all his material to be assembled and/or refurbished. He had taken the risk of buying over all the unassembled and unfurbished wooden furniture from a rubber wood furniture manufacturing factory in the industrial estate about 10 km away, buying over the whole stock and transferring all that into this new mansions premises and also into the storage spaces he built.
These specially made furniture are actually designed furniture which were originally for the export market.
On the closure of the manufacturing plant a couple of years ago, these furniture were then allowed to be sold locally. He now has only to assemble and refurbish these furniture and marketing them. That will be the new vision of the his young entrepreneur.
When I visited him he was busy planning for the marketing of these furniture. In addition he is also adding new product lines to complement what he already has. He has the people to help him and to date he says that he has got interested parties to purchase his products.
And as for the maintenance of the abandoned mansion which he has bought over, he has plans but this may not materialise unless he can market his products.
The mansion has a long history and this I shall make more research and will write more about it at a later date when I get all the facts in place.
What is of interest here is not the furniture assembling and refurbishing work but the mansion itself. Looking at the building, its all seems to be very symmetrical, whichever way you look at it. From left, from right, from front and from the back.
At a particular angle, one can see triangles and a pyramid.
Fascinating. I have not enough photographs here to show all these shapes, but if one cares to visit the site one can see how the builder played with the the symmetry of the building.
Why is it necessary for a building in the tropic to have chimney? Maybe the designer had something else in mind but since the building was never finished or never been lived in it by the designer we shall never know. Maybe just a ventilation hole.
The red coloured (or is it pink?) structure is the chimney which leads to the top of the roof.
And the hall at the basement of the building looks so grand. And the staircase connecting the back of the building to the upstairs, and also to and from the main hall, its beyond belief at the futuristic outlook of the designer.
The porch, was it meant to put cars in them or was it something else?
The arches on the two sides of the building, why were they built? We can only speculate, as I said above. And why all the arches all over the building?
The waterfall in the garden is simply made, probably on second thought. Its a give way, its not in symmetry with the building, its a foreign element from the design. Why was it created in the first place?
Coming back to the real world, the mansion is now owned, as far as I know, by En Mohamad Awik (hp 6019-9890468) who trades as M Tech Cabinet Centre and also as Gerbang Magna Enterprise. As I said earlier, he has bought over lock, stock and barrel of manufactured but not furbished or assembled chairs and table parts from a Company who used to operate a manufacturing plant at the nearby Songsang Industrial Estate. He says, on receiving orders he will furbish and assemble these furniture and transport them to any of his customer. He is also trading in other special wooden furniture, mostly hand made, and also in wooden wall paneling and wooden flooring. He has high hope for his business.
If Batu Gajah in Perak has Kelly's Castle, why can't Temerloh in Pahang have similar?.
Labels: mansion
posted by mylias | 7:45 AM
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