Their halls may no longer echo with the footsteps of marching soldiers, but the conversion of heritage military buildings into five-star hotels not only heralds a return of the warm cacophony of human activity, but also breathes new, albeit commercial, life into these grande dames of colonial architecture.

The latest development to benefit from such an overhaul is Hong Kong’s 1881 Heritage, a 130,000 sq ft complex that sees a former marine police headquarters reintegrated into the urban fabric of Tsim Sha Tsui. At the heart of this project is a cosy 10-room boutique hotel, its decor heavily influenced by Chinese art, from the imperial to the contemporary pop era. An upmarket shopping arcade and an exhibition hall occupy the rest of the site.

Back home, the ongoing $1.68 billion South Beach project promises to reinvigorate the former Beach Road camp. The site, comprising of three 1930s army barracks and a 1950s clubhouse, originally built for non-commissioned officers, will see the addition of two Foster + Partners-designed high-rise luxury hotels, as well as residential, office and retail space. The original buildings will be artfully incorporated into the development for hotel-related uses such as function rooms.

Targeted to open in 2012, South Beach will join the recently completed Capella and Amara Sanctuary hotels as Singapore’s handful of hotels converted from old military buildings. Not only do these offer plush accommodations to the discerning traveller, the latter two have both won the prestigious URA Architectural Heritage Award in recognition of their high-quality preservation efforts. For many of our nation’s ex-conscripts, these developments will surely provide a bit of nostalgia, allowing them to quite literally relive their national service days — this time, in pure luxury.

Casual Fridays are quickly becoming the norm at corporate offices nationwide, but where would one draw the line between business casual and just plain inappropriate? For starters, if you want to lose the wingtips and wear sneakers to the office, you have to be very clever about how you put your outfits together.

The good news is that many high-end fashion and footwear brands have caught on the trend, offering dressy sneakers whose design won’t look out of place in the boardroom — making it easier for you to avoid office fashion faux pas.

Pair one of these up with dressy jeans and a sharp blazer and you’re good to go, whether you’re still climbing the corporate ladder, or enjoying the view from the top.

Winner of URA’s 2009 Architectural Heritage Awards for his conservation efforts, Richard Ho wonders if Singaporeans are doing enough to preserve our historical buildings.

Since URA established its conservation guidelines in 1990, more than 5,000 buildings have been conserved — that’s remarkable.

Of course, in retrospect, there were some projects that could have been done with more sensitivity, and with a better understanding of its context and why they were worth conserving. But, generally, during the past few years, we have seen a more enlightened attitude towards the conservation of our architectural heritage.

About 10 years ago, I initiated a project. It tried to identify post-independence architecture that should be conserved, because I believe the 60’s and 70’s were brave years during which the architectural scene took on the challenge of evolving a regional architecture. Unfortunately, it was abandoned due to lack of funds. But I’m glad the Singapore Heritage Society is now taking up the project. It’s also garnered the support of the URA. The project has now become rather urgent before more of these significant buildings are demolished or “retrofitted” beyond recognition.

Going forward, I would like to see the agencies in charge of tourism stop mucking around with our heritage. Our heritage is not something to be neatly packaged for tourist consumption. There are layers and layers of overlapping histories and stories of many different peoples that made Singapore, not only the Chinese, Indians and Malays. For example, Chinatown and Little India were labels invented for easy tourist consumption — there is no collective consciousness of such names among the older generations. Confine the theme parks to Sentosa; we don’t need any on the main island.