Celebrate Singapore heritage through technology at the Google Shophouse
Google Shophouse
Have a techie SG50 outing!
Suitably located in a hipster enclave along Spottiswoode Park Road, the Google Shophouse is two stories of cultural immersion booths and student coding camps rolled into one. The Google Shophouse launch was officiated by Mr. Lawrence Wong, Minister for Culture, Community and Youth and is open to the public for six days starting tomorrow, the 1st and 2nd August 2015, and then again on the long National Day weekend from the 7th to 10th August 2015 from 10am to 5pm. Here's what you can expect to see at the Shophouse.
Singapore Time Walk
The Singapore Time Walk is a specifically designed augmented reality app by Google as sort of an SG50 birthday present to Singapore. With Time Walk, you can use your smartphone camera to point at landmarks such as the former City Hall or Old Supreme Court, bring up information and trivia about the place, plus view what the location looked like in the past. The coolest feature however, has to be the animated playback view of the past 50 years of these selected landmark locations. Google collaborated with the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth, National Heritage Board and Urban Redevelopment Authority to secure as many historical images as they can to form this historical reconstruction. While the app is currently only available on the Play Store for Android devices, it should be available for iOS in the near future. Google has also said that they will continue development to include more locations.
Google Cultural Institute
The Google Cultural Institute is a global initiative that was started back in 2011 designed to digitize cultural and art exhibits for posterity and to make them available to the public. In the Google Shophouse, you'll be able to explore the Singapore specific collections to the Cultural Institute such as the National Heritage Board's Great Peranakans: Fifty Remarkable Lives exhibit. Besides the NHB, Google also worked with the Singapore Art Museum and Urban Redevelopment Authority to curate historical works for this initiative.
Google Maps and Street View
Besides showcasing some of the tech that makes Google Maps possible such as the Google Trekker and Trolley, the Google Shophouse exhibit will also feature 40 all-new 360-degree panoramic Street View locations and landmarks that tie in to SG50 celebrations.
Google x Saturday Kids Coding Camp
The second floor of the Google Shophouse will be converted into coding camps for students conducted by Saturday Kids across the six days that the Shophouse is open. You can view more information about these free workshops at saturdaykids.sg, though it would seem that the registration for the classes has been fully booked at time of writing.