Impressions of Georgetown – Windows to our past

Penang Island, especially in Georgetown, one still can see many pre-war shop houses. Most of them were in miserable state but it was good to see effort is being made to conserve them as part of Malaysian history. Some less fortunate houses were demolished and replaced by so-called modern but spiritless buildings.

In this post, I would like to focus on the windows of these shop houses. There are colourful, artistic and yet practical for tropical climate.

One of the best conservation and restoration effort has to be the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion (better known as the “Blue Mansion”). It was the winner of UNESCO Asia-Pacific Cultural Heritage Award (year 2000).

I notice this blog compressed the photos, so you cannot see the details of the original pictures. I cropped a sample to show you the details of the ceramic deco. The workmanship was stunning.

Some windows have tinted and semi-transparent glasses.

Some were mainly carved out from wood.