Systems Integration Asia — February-March 2018

Novena Church: Architect Goes Beyond Job Scope for Perfection

Ensuring Seamless Syncing of Structure And Texture

INTERVIEW

It was a great pleasure for me to meet Senior Architectural

Associate, Melvin Gamayot of cgnArchitects Pte Ltd. One of the

biggest sore point for many in the AV industry is the lack of

communication or ability to work towards a common ground

between an Architect and the AV consultant or System Integrator

on a project. It was thus a breath of fresh air of how Melvin not

only showed exibility but took initiative to learn about acoustics

to ensure that he made informed decisions.

The Church of St Alphonsus in Thomson Road, Singapore, better

known and referred to as Novena Church, is renowned for

drawing the multitudes of faithful and even non-faithful who

come to the Novena services on Saturdays. The church attracted

as many as 20,000 for its services on Saturdays and it was

bursting at its seams when the church decided that it needed a

larger worship hall. After 3 years of development, the church re-

opened for its rst service in the last quarter of 2017. The church

(L-R) Melvin Gamayot with David Seow

had to adhere to conservation regulations and thus kept the

facade of the old church with the side adjoined to the newly built

sanctuary. The new church has a traditional classical church design

and is able to accommodate 1500 worshippers.

Melvin highlights, “The church is run by the Redemptorist priests

whose objective is to evangelise and help the poor and the

abandoned. Many people come to the church for help through

prayers. For the church it was important that the new sanctuary

continued the work that they had been doing in the past but at a

larger scale.”

• by Thomas Richard Prakasam