Brutalism in Indonesia

Indonesia's first president Sukarno, himself trained as an engineer, made modern architecture a tool of nation building in the 1950s and 1960s, filling Jakarta with monuments, stadiums and towers along new ceremonial axes. Concrete construction continued through the New Order boom of the 1970s, when office towers such as the Wisma Hayam Wuruk Office Tower (1975) brought a heavier, frankly structural expression to the capital's commercial districts. Deep sun-shading and exposed frames made concrete a practical answer to the tropical climate as much as a stylistic choice.