Designing the Everyday: 5 New BTO Estates to Visit
- ksy
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Over the years, the architectural design of Singapore’s Built-to-Order (BTO) housing by Housing & Development Board has evolved way beyond pure efficiency. While earlier generations prioritised repetition and speed of construction, more recent projects reveal a growing sensitivity to context, climate, and everyday human experience. Today’s estates are increasingly defined by how spaces are framed, how light and ventilation move through them, and how residents encounter architecture at eye level.
From an architectural photography perspective, this evolution is especially evident. Facades are no longer flat backdrops but layered compositions, often distinguished by carefully considered colour palettes and project-specific design languages. Void decks have transformed into spatial thresholds—places to pause, gather, and experience changing light conditions—while landscape design now plays a critical role in shaping atmosphere, scale, and visual continuity.
We visited a selection of newly completed BTO estates, primarily across Singapore’s eastern neighbourhoods. These developments stood out not only for their planning strategies, but for how architecture, landscape, and urban context come together in ways that are visually and spatially compelling.
Here are five BTO estates worth checking out. Even if you are not a resident, the design features alone make them worth a visit.
1. Dakota One
Architect: AWP Architects
Set within the mature Dakota precinct, Dakota One is shaped by its dense urban surroundings—close to major roads, MRT infrastructure, and long-established residential blocks. The estate responds with a composed architectural language that balances visual presence with restraint.
A defining feature of Dakota One is its green-toned façade palette, which lends the development a calm, cohesive identity. Subtle patterning across the elevations, combined with vertical fins and recessed balconies, introduces depth and rhythm, allowing the buildings to shift character under different lighting conditions. From a photographic standpoint, these elements create clean sightlines and repeated motifs that read well from both street level and elevated viewpoints.
At ground level, landscaped communal spaces are paired with a low-rise community centre that integrates gently into the estate. This softer massing helps ease the transition between public and residential zones, reinforcing Dakota One’s role as a calm enclave within a highly connected east-side neighbourhood.
2. Hougang Citrine
Architect: JGP Architecture (S) Pte Ltd
Hougang Citrine sits within a well-established heartland, and its design reflects a careful negotiation between new architecture and familiar urban patterns. The estate is organised into smaller precinct clusters, creating layered courtyards and semi-enclosed communal spaces that encourage interaction without feeling exposed.
Architecturally, the use of warm, orangey tones and textured façade treatments helps break down the scale of the blocks, making them feel more approachable from street level. Varied block heights and generous setbacks introduce visual relief—qualities that translate well in both wide urban shots and more intimate architectural details.
For photographers, Hougang Citrine presents a clear narrative of contemporary public housing adapting itself to a mature neighbourhood, rather than overpowering it.
3. MacPherson Weave
Architect: 3PArchitects
Located near the city fringe, MacPherson Weave reflects a denser and more urban expression of BTO design. Connectivity is the central design theme here, expressed through elevated walkways, landscaped decks, and visual corridors that link different parts of the estate.
The architecture is more expressive, with stronger colour accents, perforated screens, and layered massing giving the development a dynamic identity. These elements create opportunities for architectural photography that focuses on repetition, geometry, and perspective—particularly when viewed from oblique angles or along circulation paths.
MacPherson Weave captures a shift towards more complex spatial compositions in public housing, mirroring the intensifying urban conditions of the east-side city fringe.
4. MacPherson Blossom
Architect: Architects Team 3
In contrast, MacPherson Blossom adopts a softer, more residential tone. The estate is defined by lighter colour palettes, gentler forms, and an emphasis on greenery integrated throughout the development.
Landscape design plays a prominent role in shaping the estate’s character. Pocket gardens, shaded walkways, and planted decks create moments of pause that become especially apparent when experienced on foot. Subtle variations in façade treatment help distinguish individual blocks while maintaining overall cohesion.
From a visual standpoint, MacPherson Blossom lends itself to quieter compositions—where architecture, planting, and human scale come together to form calm, everyday scenes.
5. Bartley Greenrise
Architect: AGA Architects Pte Ltd
Bartley Greenrise stands out for its strong emphasis on greenery and vertical layering. Positioned near transport infrastructure and arterial roads, the estate uses planting as both an environmental buffer and a defining architectural feature.
Green terraces, sky gardens, and planted facades introduce depth and texture to the blocks, softening their overall mass. A consistent geometric language across the façades provides structure, while greenery introduces variation across seasons and lighting conditions—an interplay that is particularly striking in photographs.
Bartley Greenrise reflects a growing emphasis on biophilic design in public housing, aligning sustainability with visual and spatial quality.
Together, these five BTO estates offer a snapshot of how public housing design in Singapore—particularly across the eastern and city-fringe districts—continues to mature. Beyond planning efficiency, there is now clearer attention to form, materiality, and how architecture is experienced visually and spatially.
For architects, residents, and those who document the built environment, these estates demonstrate that contemporary BTO developments are no longer merely functional backdrops to daily life. They are increasingly legible pieces of urban architecture—designed to be lived in, moved through, and quietly observed.
By Kevin Siyuan, Director at Shiya Creative Studio
View more of our HDB public housing architecture photography portfolio here:
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