The Architecture of Dutch Colonial Office in Indonesia and the Adaptation to Tropical Climate

Dutch colonization to Indonesian occurred for about 350 years. During this time, a lot of colonial buildings were built in Indonesia with various typologies and architectures which were developed in the era. It was the shape and typology of the building which was similar to the buildings in Netherland (17th century) or Europe and the architecture which was developed and influenced by modern architecture (20th century) that are developing in all over the world. In the early 20th century, Dutch architects started to work in big cities in Indonesia such as Jakarta, Surabaya, Bandung, Semarang, Medan, etc. In its practice, the architects developed the building designs by considering the architectural character and local climate that is humid-tropical climate. The pioneer architects were CP Wolff Schoemaker, Henri Maclaine Pont, HP Berlage and urban planning architect, Thomas Karsten. These four architects were also known as the architects who popularized “Indisch” style [1]. The problem with tropical climate has been studied by the architects in Netherland and has been a component to design both private building such as house and public building such as office, hospital, school, worship place, etc. For office building, especially, together with the development of modern architecture in many parts of the world, followed by the development of building technology especially concrete technology, the architecture of Dutch colonial offices become the area for Dutch architects to design the offices based on their ideologies. One of the mark is to design the buildings which are adapted to the tropical climate where the buildings are about to be developed