Macalister Mansion

Located along the historic Macalister Road, Macalister Mansion promises a quirky and sophisticated new lifestyle destination to relax and unwind. Set amidst a lovingly restored colonial mansion that was built in the early 1900s, it invites you to embark on a luxuriously new boutique hotel adventure in the heart of Georgetown, Penang.

Macalister Mansion is designed around the idea of an old English mansion. Each space is designed to provide hospitaliy of an actual home – good food, fine drink, engaging conversation, soothing music, a good night’s sleep or simply lounging by the pool.

Within Macalister Mansion, each space within its food & beverage outlets together with the hotel is branded as distinct rooms found in a mansion: Dining Room, The Den, Living Room, The Cellar, The Lawn and 8 Rooms.

The name Macalister Mansion honours Sir Norman Macalister, one of the first British Governors of Penang (then known as Prince of Wales Island) from 1808 – 1810. Sir Norman Macalister also gave his name to Macalister Road, where the boutique hotel is situated.

Designed and branded as a lifestyle oriented ‘residence’, the Macalister Mansion and the 6 F&B and Hotel entities that comprise it have been conceived as a single holistic vision by the Ministry of Design based in Singapore.

 

The oversized sculptural bust of Macalister encapsulates the spirit of Macalister Mansion – the meeting of heritage and contemporary design. The 2.5m bust is the first art piece to greet you as you approach the mansion from along the hedge lined driveway. It draws inspiration from traditional portrait busts of important figures but instead of the typical life-like features, Macalister’s features are modernised by rendering them as sharp edged fractal lines – as if sculptured by computer aided design. The piece is constructed in fiberglass and spray painted a high gloss white finish.

 

 

 

 

The dining room of Macalister Mansion is conceived as a whimsical experience where the diner enjoys the formality of fine dining that is imbued with a contrasting fairy tale-like quality – pastel coloured deer graze around a tree whilst squirrels and birds perch on its branches. The pink, blue and yellow animals complement the all white dining room and are constructed from fiberglass and finished in high gloss paint.

 

 

 

The murals done on the walls of Living Room reflect a contemporary take on a classic European Living Room. In line with the concept of Macalister Mansion, the approach is clean and simple, using black line art. The illustrations comprise furniture and fixtures typically found in a living room like a fireplace, mantelpiece, bookshelves, oscillating fan and various object d’art.

 

The steel lines are used to show the connection between men and women during British colonial period. The staggered lines are compressed but somehow scattered, performing the melody of the stories after years by using the language of art.

 

This poem, simply entitled “Sonnet”, is composed in the time-honoured style of a short-lyric piece. The sonnet form originated in Renaissance Italy and was subsequently made more famous by English writers such as Shakespeare. It comprises 14 lines with a certain rhythm and also rhyming end words which give a musical effect like a song, when read aloud. This love poem re-imagines and expresses the affection between the Lieutenant-Governor and his wife during a temporary period of separation while he was on duty in Penang and she was in their homeland, Scotland.

All info and images © www.macalistermansion.com

 

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