A Walk Through 36 Stewart Lane: Ground Floor

First Installment: Ground Floor

Situated on the north side of Stewart Lane, nestled among a row of four shophouses of similar style, stands 36 Stewart Lane. To its left, two shophouses with elaborate floor tiles line the five-foot way leading to a series of boarded up and dilapidated shophouses. To its right, sharing our wall is a single and newly restored shophouse, with its opposite side facing a majestic green colonial bungalow. Against the clacking of tiles emanating from the mahjong parlour across the street, the smell of coffee roasting down the block, the sweltering mid-day heat, the echo of the bell from St. Georges Church and the occasional ringing of a passing beca, entering the shophouse itself is a surreal experience. This building has accommodated over a hundred years of history passing by and through it. It has witnessed the passages of time dating from the heyday of colonialism through the struggle for national independence to the present day. It is not only a space where lives have been lived, but also where memories are etched into every brick, stone and tile. It has been lived in and the building itself has lived. Each of its previous occupants left a piece of themselves in the house and the imbrications of their stories still breathe.

It is against this backdrop that our journey to 36 Stewart Lane began in 2010. As with the common layout of shophouses in Penang, the first step through the doors takes you into a small square room. Since a shophouse literally means both a shop and a house, the front room is often used as a formal place of business. In our case, the room was used as an office. From the floor to the ceiling, piles and piles of folders and paperwork were haphazardly stacked. The shelves were filled with documents yellowing and falling apart, occupying every nook and cranny. Every tabletop, chair and empty space, was crammed with paper. The room was overflowing with materials spanning decades in Bahasa, English and Chinese languages. An aging air conditioner struggled to keep up with the blistering heat. It made the room livable. In so many ways, the humming of the air conditioner was strangely comforting. On one side of the room sat an imposing desk of a sprite Chinese gentleman who ran his business. On the other side, there were chairs reserved for his clients. A thin wooden wall separated the formal workspace and the living quarters. It is where the much-touted modern concept of working from the home has been in practice for centuries in this part of Southeast Asia.

After passing through the front room, one can really begin to appreciate the distinct character of a shophouse. The ingenious design of the airwell marks the shophouse as one of the most habitable types of urban buildings. It is an architectural feature that was ahead of its time. The center of the house feels massive in its size. The ceiling occupies a dizzying height above the floor. Craning our necks up towards the open roof, we saw that the previous owners had fashioned a convertible. A long rope is connected to a panel on the ceiling that can be opened and closed, depending on the weather pattern. This not only allowed proper circulation when needed, but also provided protection from the heavy rain. The original structure had an open ceiling in the airwell and when it rained, water fell into a special granite area that provided excellent drainage, much like an atrium. However, to make it safe and livable, the original granite floor was completely covered with smooth concrete and tiles, making the closing of the roof during the rain an unfortunate necessity.

Closed Airwell

Living Space

From the airwell there is a staircase on the right leading up to the first floor. Straight-ahead lies about 30 feet of open floor space with two bedrooms on the right side and a narrow hallway to the left that leads to the kitchen. These rooms were added by the previous owner and served as the primary living space for his family. The bedroom ceiling was also a recent addition, creating about 4 feet of space between the top of the rooms and the bottom of the original second floor. The space was used as storage. None of the timber, walls or features of this section of the house are original.

Beyond the bedrooms are the kitchen and two bathrooms, which we will describe in greater detail in the Second Installment.