Project B is a café nestled in Sentul, a forgotten railway town in Malaysia. We wanted to reintroduce diners to the rich history of its surrounding neighbourhoods.

With Buka Pintu (meaning “open doors” in Malay), we captured patterns of old gates and windows in Sentul and recreated beautiful designs, representing stories of the people behind them.

These designs were used to beautify the café, along with a call-to-action to discover the pattern’s stories online. By reimagining patterns of traditional gates, we breathed new life to the old.

We explored Sentul, taking note of the various patterns we saw on the gates, windows and doors of older homes there. We also talked to the people who lived in those homes, to learn what they had to say about how Sentul has changed over time.

We then recreated beautiful designs from the patterns, representing the stories of the people behind them.

Everything was posted on projectsentul.com for people to read and print out. People were encouraged to come and visit Sentul – perhaps they could begin by visiting the Project B café, where they could buy physical versions of the artwork on the Project Sentul website.