The Reserve

MonoLab Studio

Client: Gregor Gregersen

Nestled within Changi’s quiet business district in Singapore, The Reserve transforms a former six-storey electronics warehouse into a world-class vault for precious commodities. Engineered originally for heavy industrial loads, the 32-metre-high, 16,700-square-metre structure required minimal structural intervention. At its core lies a monumental, hangar-like volume, 1,836 square metres in footprint with a soaring 30-metre height, now reimagined as the facility’s principal vaulting chamber.

The project unfolds against a broader urban shift. Once a logistics hub, Changi has seen declining industrial activity, accelerated by post-pandemic work patterns. Many buildings now stand underutilised. The Reserve responds with a thoughtful proposition: that adaptive reuse can breathe new life into aging infrastructure, quietly guiding the area’s ongoing transformation. Conceived as a study in dualities, the architecture explores the tension between heritage and innovation, tradition and emerging financial technologies. The façade is clad in thinned onyx laminated between glass, an expressive metaphor for the convergence of past and future. Its materiality suggests both the enduring robustness of precious commodities and the transparency central to new digital economies. Each piece of onyx was digitally scanned and composed into a continuous, book-matched elevation. This precise orchestration creates a facade of quiet complexity, organic yet meticulously ordered. As one moves around the building, the pattern reveals itself gradually. The stone’s translucency allows light to animate the surface throughout the day. By daylight, sunlight filters inward, bathing the interiors in a warm, golden glow. By night, the building becomes a luminous beacon, with internal lighting softly illuminating the veined stone from within. Inside, interventions are restrained, preserving the building’s industrial form while enhancing the user experience. A double-height entry portal frames an intimate, terracotta-hued lobby suffused with daylight passing through the onyx. Beyond it, a series of hushed, labyrinthine corridors leads to the cavernous vault, where shafts of light reveal glimmers of precious metals, disclosing the building’s guarded purpose. At the heart of the office levels, a spiral staircase links the various floors. Above it, a skylight integrated with a water feature filters natural light into the core, lending an ethereal presence. A cantilevered meeting pod, suspended 25 metres above the vault, offers a rare vantage point over the architecture of wealth preservation. The Reserve’s adaptable spatial configuration accommodates a diverse program: secure vaults, offices, lounges, galleries, an auction hall, and retail. This vertical integration cultivates a dynamic ecosystem for collaboration, education, and exchange within the bullion industry. It celebrates traditional craftsmanship, from watchmaking to metalwork, while embracing forward-looking technologies, enriching both businesses and communities. Complementing its functional spaces, wellness-focused amenities support work-life balance, fostering healthier, more connected daily routines within this quiet monument of industry reimagined.