The Bonham Building was a historic landmark at the corner of Bonham Street and Chulia Street in Singapore. Work on the block began in early 1894 after a fire razed a number of godowns along Bonham Street and was projected to finish by 1896. However, a collapse toward the end of 1895 killed 11 labourers and caused a major delay in construction. Completed in 1897 as the Katz Brothers Building, it served as the premises of the Katz Brothers until 1912, when the firm relocated to Raffles Place.
The local branch of the Yokohama Specie Bank moved in in 1916 and it was in this period that the building came to be known as the Bonham Building. The bank relocated in 1933, and two years after it became the headquarters of the newly founded United Chinese Bank, later renamed the United Overseas Bank. It also emerged as a centre for local law firms, though by the 1950s it had gained a reputation for housing "struggling" or "lesser known" law firms and "mediocre" lawyers. The structure was demolished in 1970 to make way for the UOB Building.
Description
The "ornate" three-storey block, at the corner of Bonham Street and Chulia Street, running the full length of the latter to the junction with Boat Quay, was described in The Straits Times as being "executed in the style of the Renaissance" and in the Singapore Free Press And Mercantile Advertiser as being "of the Classical Renaissance style of architecture", though writer Julian Davison noted that the newspapers of the day often described "any kind of building with a vaguely Classical mien" as 'Renaissance'. There were corinthian pillars accompanied by "handsome" capitals. The façade was to be light grey and white in colour. The original plan for the structure called for "customary stucco work" and an "exceptionally large" frontage at the main entrance on the corner of Bonham Street and Chulia Street, being 70ft tall. Facing onto Raffles Place, it was to feature an "effective display" in the "shape of a handsome clock tower". This tower element later became a dome. The corner of Bonham Street and Boat Quay was to be similar, though without the dome. The building was to run the entire 218ft length of Bonham Street and 34ft along Boat Quay. In addition to the main entrance, there were two other entrances; one on Bonham Street and the other on Boat Quay. The Straits Times considered it "one of the most ornamental business houses in the Far East, with "architectural attractions" on all three frontages.
The building's interior featured "very lofty and spacious" rooms, made "absolutely secure" through the ironwork, with iron frames consisting of "cast iron H-section and box section stanchions supporting I-section beams of mild steel." The material, with its "supposed incombustibility", lessened the risk of fires whilst allowing for fewer "cumbersome" load-bearing walls, allowing for a more "flexible" layout. The Bonham Street and Chulia Street corner was to have "well arranged" windows and "extensive" showrooms on the ground floor. The Boat Quay frontage was to have shop space to be let out. Behind the shop on the ground floor were the warehouses which, opened to the quay. The building's lift was found here. There were "massive" columns on the ground floor, which additionally served to delineate the different departments of the store, which were arranged such that patrons would have "no difficulty". The departments on this floor were for 'arms and ammunition', harness and saddlery, bicycles, leather goods and plateware on the right, alcohol, cigarettes and watches and clocks on the left, and the tailoring department at the back, in addition to stationery, lamps and chandeliers.
A wide and "handsome" staircase led to another salesroom on the floor above, which was similar in size and dedicated to furniture, musical instruments and toys. The top floor housed several apartments, fitted with bathrooms, reading, dressing and lounge rooms and to be let out, which "[commanded] a breezy situation with excellent views." There was also a Muslim prayer room, installed as part of a promise Katz Brothers head Hermann Katz had made to Sultan Abu Bakar of Johor, and the working room for the tailoring department. Other amenities available to customers on that floor included a men's smoking room, a ladies' room and bathrooms. The tower had a few long chairs and was intended for siestas.
History Construction and collapse The Katz Brothers, a German trading company and department store founded in 1865, moved into the site at the corner of Bonham Street and what was then known as Kling Street (renamed Chulia Street in 1921), the former Oriental Bank Building, after acquiring its occupants Kahlenbach, Engler & Co. By 1893, it the firm had made plans to redevelop their main building. On the night of 14 November, a fire destroyed much of the buildings along Bonham Street down to Boat Quay, though the property of Katz Brothers suffered comparatively little damage. The firm took the opportunity to expand, leasing the property from Peranakan merchant and landowner Tan Jiak Kim, who was to rebuild the entire block of godowns bound by Bonham Street, Kling Street and Boat Quay, with the intent of occupying the newly-erected structure, with the building at the corner of Bonham Street and Kling Street housing the stores and the godowns behind housing its warehouses.
Architectural firm Crane Brothers was commissioned by Tan to work on the new premises, with Alfred William Lermit initially being put in charge of the site at the corner. Work on the block, which was at 6 & 8 Bonham Street, 31 & 31A Kling Street and 6-8 Boat Quay, and initially named the Kim Seng Building after Tan's grandfather Tan Kim Seng, was to begin in January 1894 and it was initially scheduled to be complete in about 18 months. The plans for the building were approved by Municipal Engineer James MacRitchie, who died in office the year later. The godowns razed by the fire were to be rebuilt first and the firm was to move their head offices into those temporarily while the corner was being built. The site was then on "one of the busiest thoroughfares", thus "[presenting] every advantage for the effective display of their high class stock." The Free Press opined that this was reflective of the "rapid strides which artistic decorative plasterwork [had] taken" in Singapore, with firms "no longer contented with the ultalitarian brick boxes with slate lids which formerly did duty as places of business". The block which was to be temporarily occupied was completed by March 1895, and Katz Brothers moved in on the 5th of that month. It was then expected that the entire block would be completed by August 1896. By September 1895, work on the premises had "pushed on with considerable vigour".
After the foundations were laid by Crane Brothers, Tan chose to have the building "erected without European supervision". Having received a duplicate of the plans, he instead hired local builder Tan Joo Guan as the superintendent and three Chinese contractors led by Peck Kim Sai. Tan Joo Guan was not officially certified, though he had been in Tan Jiak Kim's service for several years and had worked under both Crane Brothers and Swan & Maclaren. His work for Tan Jiak Kim included the premises of Kelly & Walsh at 5 Battery Road. He was put in charge of acquiring the material for the construction. Tan Jiak Kim later claimed that he and Crane Brothers had an "understanding" that Joon Guan would consult them if needed. Crane Brothers instead claimed that they "had tried very hard" to be allowed to superintend construction, though they were refused each time they attempted to do so. The store on Boat Quay had been completed early as the tenants, a Chinese shop owned by Lim Boon Keng and A. Meyer, were "anxious to enter", though their moving in was delayed. After this was completed, the labourers carried on to the corner, which consisted of "massive piers only" and they began "running these up perhaps too quickly". The corner facing the square had been nearing completion, save for the dome, which had yet to be placed, and the central block was still "in an incomplete stage".
On the evening of 28 September, the still under construction 80ft-long portion fronting Chulia Street collapsed, killing 11 of the 13 labourers who were sleeping in a wooden shanty in the unfinished five-foot way, and severely injuring another. The only labourer who escaped unscathed, having left the way just before the collapse, reported that there was only a brief "premonitory" rumbling before "several thousand tons of new brickwork [fell] along the lines of the verandah into the street", burying the rest of the labourers. As the incident took place at a time when the typically bustling street was largely "deserted", only labourers on-site at the time were caught in the collapse. The Free Press proclaimed then that the situation was caused indirectly by the lack of the "usual skilled supervision" and then the contractor "running up his buildings unequally in height instead of in uniform layers." The completed portion was 70ft tall, and the adjoining portion had walls built up to 44ft with 24ft piers between them.
Shortly after the collapse, Crane Brothers' chief architect Edward Osborne suggested that the collapse could have been partially attributed to the poor supervision and the "bad" workmanship, with "tall and massive" piers being "run up too rapidly, by far too much at once." The piers carried heavy floors which were built of "soft Chinese bricks and feeble mortar" as opposed to hard bricks and cement. The situation was worsened by an "exceptionally heavy and prolonged" storm the afternoon before the collapse. Osborn noted that the front on Boat Quay, identical to the Kling Street front and having been constructed with the same level of worksmanship still stood, and stated his belief that the piers in the collapsed portion had been "run up too quickly for wet weather", and the heavy rain when the mortar was "just in a spongy position condition ready to absorb all the water it [could] get". It was later found that the second pillar in the building had cracked severely before the collapse, and that this, in addition to the rain and the masonry being "brought on to the cracked pillar too fast", before the mortar could set, had caused the collapse. Peck later claimed to have noticed the cracks on 23 September and informed Joo Guan, but not the building inspector, who he alleged did not visit in between that date and the collapse. Joo Guan claimed that he was not informed of the cracks and that he "did not give up [his] whole time to this building, as [he] had other work to do."