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Lucasfilm Unveils "Sandcrawler" Singapore Office

An anonymous reader writes "The massive, slow moving Sandcrawlers from George Lucas' Star Wars films inspired the form of Lucasfilm's new regional headquarters in Singapore. Designed by Aedas, the Sandcrawler Building will house a 100 seat theater, Lucasfilm Singapore offices, a public podium and other employee spaces. Neither rusty nor slow moving in this case, the glassy and streamlined building will combine a high performance facade with lush gardens and foliage that spills over terraces, resulting in a highly efficient commercial space. With construction already underway, we can look forward to this real life Star Wars manifestation sometime in 2012."

14 of 159 comments (clear)

  1. Re:what the flook ? by Osgeld · · Score: 2

    it says right there in the article, he needs a theater for his ego, its not as strong in the east

  2. Re:Asia by Oxford_Comma_Lover · · Score: 2

    Comparing the most expensive hotel in the world to a local Walmart may tend to distort the "nicer looking" scale. =)

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    -- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
  3. Re:Looks like a toaster by newcastlejon · · Score: 2

    You want to see a monstrosity? There aren't any near me, but this comes pretty close.

    We call it the slug.

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    If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.
  4. Re:Asia by hedwards · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That's not really true. Had you been around thousands of years ago to see what are now Greek ruins they would have been quite the sight. Unfortunately, due to whether and deterioration you don't get to see the bright colors that were original.

    The main difference is that the temples in SE Asia relied more upon detail carved into the rock than treatments applied to the building materials.

  5. Re:Asia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    I guess you've never been to downtown Paris. Or Prague. Or Antwerp. Or Stockholm. Or lots of other places in Europe.

    Furthermore, "Asia" covers a lot of ground. Pick a random city in Vietnam or Pakistan or China and you'll find plenty of the usual hellish concrete boxes. Cherrypicking Singapore is a bit silly.

  6. How Appropriate... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If memory serves, the sandcrawlers were the mobile headquarters for the Jawas, a smelly little species known for their skill in picking over and/or stealing the detritus of more advanced civilizations, bodging it up just enough to get it moving off the sales lot under its own power, and then skipping town.

    This seems like an eminently appropriate architectural allusion for the 'late-Lucas' period of Lucasfilms' work...

    1. Re:How Appropriate... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 4, Interesting

      If I remember correctly, the rationalization(most likely a retcon) was that Tatooine was originally a much more ambitious mining colony that, for some sort of convenient plot-related reasons, failed to pan out. The investors said "fuck it" and abandoned all the equipment not worth pulling back out of the gravity well, along with the assorted scum and yokels who were hanging around to either take advantage of the distant location or scratch out a feeble living. That was supposed to explain how they had sandcrawlers in the first place, those being rather above their tech level, and how a lifestyle based on nomadic scrounging and tinkering could possibly make sense...

    2. Re:How Appropriate... by EdIII · · Score: 2

      You guys are cracking me up... lol. Seriously....

      George Lucas wrote the movie and filmed it in the 70's. Rational explanations? How about how much drugs were done in the 70's? Trust me, there was some rationalization about a lot of things in the movie, but the kind you only understand when you are really really fucked up.

      I heard the guy that played Chewbacca was stoned half the time during the film. It's the only way he could pull off those sounds.

  7. Re:Asia by Hartree · · Score: 2

    There's a whole wikipedia article on it.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chewing_gum_ban_in_Singapore

  8. Re:Asia by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 3, Informative

    Meh. In Asia, but also in Europe, public spaces tend to look a lot better than in the USA, where they mostly look rather shabby. But moderns buildings in Asia are just as crap as in Europe and the USA, whereas in old buildings on all continents you will find attention to beauty and detail. I did not find buildings in Asia to be all that nicer.

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    If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
  9. Not the first sandcrawler corporate HQ. by davebooth · · Score: 3, Funny

    Exercise a little google-fu and check out the Best Buy corporate HQ near the Minneapolis/St Paul airport... When they built that it seemed so appropriate and in line with their corporate attitude that they'd be headquartered in a bunch of sandcrawlers. We try to avoid buying from them but if we're running out of options, somebody in the family will always say "well, in the last resort we could go look what the Jawas have got... "

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    I had a .sig once. It got boring.
  10. What retarded PR by sgage · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "Neither rusty nor slow moving in this case, the glassy and streamlined building will combine a high performance facade with lush gardens and foliage that spills over terraces, resulting in a highly efficient commercial space. "

    WTF is a high performance facade?

  11. Larry Ellison by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Larry Ellison is following suit by making his headquarters shaped like the Death Star. Coincidentally, it's aimed at Google.

  12. 'Bird Shit Architecture' in Brasilia and Beyond by ipv6_128_lgwb · · Score: 3, Informative

    Great talk about this type of Architecture http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnq1SvmZUYU