Kington Loo

Kington Loo (17 October 1930 – 21 March 2003) was an architect in Malaysia who belongs to the group who brought modernism to Southeast Asia in the wake of World War II.

Kington Loo went to St Columbas High School until Junior Cambridge when the family moved to Delhi, during the great famine of 1945.

At war's the end, the family returned to Kuala Lumpur where Kington Loo started his Form Four at the Victorian Institution.

In 1947, Loo finished his studies and joined the Government Commercial Day School where they learned typing, shorthand and book-keeping.

His architectural designs (together with the other BEP partner C.H.R Bailey) include the Dewan Tunku Canselor at the Universiti Malaya and the Subang International Airport.

A branch of the Commonwealth Society was formed in 1961, supported by Y.T.M Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra Al-Haj, Malaysia's prime minister.

The first phase of the building consisted of an entrance area and large lounge, a library-cum-committee room, and office on the ground floor.

The building's public rooms offered indoor activities such as darts, table tennis and billiards, and the entertainment programme also included films.

Its deceptively simple design consisted of a roof composed of floating concrete shells that was held aloft by mushroom-shaped columns.

Loo's business partner (in the BEP practice) and friend C.H.R Bailey designed the airport one of many collaborations that the two architects undertook in the 1950s and 1960s.

The open structure also featured a massive circular ramp, reminiscent of Berthold Lubetkin's penguin pavilion in London.

The structure was made of timber and brickwork masonry, and sported a pitched roof which harkened back to Malaya’s pre-war colonial traditions.

More of a “istana” that a bungalow, the mansion was able to breathe with its system of natural ventilation, that included metal grillwork, glass louvres, along with shading hoods, canopies and overhangs, and both vertical and horizontal fins.

It was designed by BEP (Kington Loo) as well as Akitek MAA,[5] and owned by Urban Development authority of Malaysia (UDA).

He displayed a strong commitment to the natural environment as he complained about the development of Kuala Lumpur that caused pollution in drains and river when he became the president of the Malaysian Institute of Architects (PAM).

[10] He was the chairman of the Malaysian Zoological Society, as well as the founding trustee of the World Wide Fund for Nature Malaysia (WWFM).