Colonial Architecture in Southeast Asia

The first Europeans to arrive to southeast Asia were the Portuguese. In 1511, they captured Malacca, an important trade centre in the region, and built a a fortress to protect against a Malay counter-attack. 

The Porta de Santiago is the only surviving remnant of this fortress, which became known as A Famosa, or Fortaleza Velha. This was one of four gates to the fortified enclosure.

The inscription Anno 1670 and logo of the Dutch East India Company were added after the Dutch ended Portuguese rule in Malacca in 1641. The fort was demolished after the British took Malacca in 1795 but the gate was fortunately spared.

Before kicking the Portuguese out of Malacca, the Dutch had established a trading post on Java by the early 17th century, which in 1621 was named Batavia. A square and city hall is first recorded in 1627 but the present facade is from about 1707-1710. Some of its features are reminiscent of Paleis Op de Dam, which is now a royal palace but was originally built as the city hall of Amsterdam.

French missionaries and traders were active in Vietnam since the 17th century, and the French got involved in Vietnamese politics and built the Saigon citadel in 1790. But the French conquest of the area really starts in 1859 when Saigon was taken. Its old Central Post Office was

 built in 1886-1891 to a design by architect Alfred Foulhoux.

The National Museum of Singapore was opened as the Raffles Library and Museum in 1887. The museum was founded in 1849 and the collection was previously housed in the Singapore Institution, which is considered the oldest school in Singapore. It was briefly moved to the Victoria Theatre and Concert Hall, which then existed as the city hall. The new building was commissioned in 1882 and was designed by architect Henry McCallum, but was built to a revised and scaled-down version by JF McNair. A modern annexe by W Architects was added in 2004-06, featuring a glass-clad rotunda inspired by IM Pei.

The former Attorney-Generals Chambers, which is now part of the Parliament Building in Singapore, was originally built in the 1880s, though the current design dates from 1906. The first building on the site seems to have been completed in 1839, as an annex to Maxwell's House (also known as the former Parliament House), which is considered the oldest surviving building in Singapore