OCBC Centre [1976]

Singapore’s first internationally-renowned architect-designed building, the OCBC Centre sees I.M. Pei fuse his brand of reduced, elegant Modernism with innovative construction methods, arriving at a form that took less than two years to construct. The OCBC – affectionately referred to as the ‘calculator’ for its facade treatment, was at one point in time the tallest in Southeast Asia, its scale facilitated by two massive semi-circular concrete cores with lateral girders and steel trusses reinforcing the in-between. Pei’s design can be seen as catalyst that triggered the evolution of Singapore’s skyline into that of a world-class, global city.