Meaning and Gardening In our capitalist world, should we be rethinking measures of success and happiness? This project takes cues from emergent calls for more responsible and empathetic ways of living. Precipitated by the post covid gardening boom, the project explores the possibility where a semi agrarian populace emerges from the urbanites, in a collective response to the problems of high capitalism and environmental threats. It imagines a series of interconnected extended villages on top HDB flats existing alongside mainstream Singapore society. They form a parallel community, to live in a way that addresses the major issues of the day – environmental sustainability, food sustainability, energy scarcity and the loss of empathy and mental well-being. It hints at the possibility of how Singapore may look like if it develops into a more heterogenous and diverse society. One where differences in values, lifestyles and definitions of happiness, fragments the population into smaller, but complementary & overlapping communities based on shared ideals.

- Adj. Assoc. Prof. Peter Sim