Abstract

Vernacular shop houses in Malaysia have been thoroughly studied to understand their significance in environmental, cultural, economical and heritage values. UNESCO recognition in 2008 has further secured shop houses conservation works in Malaysia (UNESCO, 2008). However, contemporary shops in Malaysia do not share similar concerns of preservation and cultural significance. Popular view has perceived contemporary shop as lacking of both cultural and building performances standards. Thus, this research testifies the cultural and building performances in both contemporary shops and vernacular shop houses through cross-content analysis onto Malaysia Uniform Building Bylaw
(UBBL), Green Building Index (GBI) and Special Area Plan (SAP). This research aims to critically investigate the correlation between vernacular and contemporary shop houses to develop a guideline strategy for green performance in shop houses. Through re-learning of vernacular shop house design and critical examination of governing policies, this research had highlighted some design issues that affects today practices. Policies are exploited to users’ interpretation that contributes to poorly built shop houses that have neither green nor cultural significance. This framework developed three distinct yet complementary areas in a bid to explore various green strategies and important criteria, which are building envelope design, green design, and cultural design to identify the correlation between green performances and cultural sensitive buildings. Hence, this research provides fundamental guides to
portray future potential of high performance shop architecture in Malaysia.