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visitors are not presented with palace lifestyle but rather with only the exhibits of cultural product
associations. There are no more rituals, customs, or traditions associated with the architecture. The status
of the palace only affords a place for displaying the artefacts from the palace. Intangible cultural values
are no longer exhibited. Thus, a new code of place attachment is created for the historical values that
accompany the museum artefacts. Hence, conservation of the physical appearance of any heritage place
should be for the purpose of preserving the physical image that recalls a mental image of the past. It is
also to augment the preservation of intangible aspects of heritage represented in cultural activities,
maintaining the cultural heritage of the place and the identity of its society. Also, it must be realised that
without the physical image, which enhances both collective and spatial memory, the changes happening
to intangible cultural activities would be less controllable.

Conclusions
Architecture is an amalgamation of art and techniques and so is reflected in traditional practices.

Art is not something one can pursue in a second, it is said to be inhabited by generations over time and
the traditional knowledge system plays a role to conserve it for timelessness or for the so-called place
attachment. Three extensive interrelated components that give meanings to places, the physical setting;
the individual’s internal psychological and social processes; and attributes and activities organised at the
place have been observed taken place at Istana Jahar.
It can be said that the architectural change that happened at Istana Jahar is the change that

maintained its cultural and architectural identity. It is its heritage that continues to be able to provide the
place attachment relating to the surrounding environment. Heritage is not just a thing or a place, but
rather cultural processes of social activities that include remembering, memory-marking, as well as a
continuous meaning-making and re-making through certain socio-cultural patterns that differ from one
place to another. Such process gives every place its own significance and defines its identity, where
intangible cultural heritage is the activities that highlight the cultural significances of different societies.
Istana Jahar provides that to the public albeit the architectural change that it had. It provides the public
with a sense of place and the place attachment. Although the concept of heritage as ‘the remains of the
past’ is still dominating the public ‘common sense’, a growing understanding of the role of heritage in
present life has started to rise on the academic level that considers ‘cultural heritage’, in particular, as the
cultural activities taking place in the present time, affected by, and learning from, inherited values that are
represented in both tangible and intangible forms.
This paper emphasises the place attachment of Istana Jahar despite the architectural change from
being a palace that catered for certain group of people to being a museum that provides knowledge to the
public. The heritage conservation steps that were taken is a process to manage the changes occurring in
place. It is rather than just a technique of freezing the image of place at some time in the past in a
picturesque emotional way for achieving the balance between the tangibles and intangibles of the palace.
Istana Jahar has maintained its identity and spirit, preserving its mainly tangible and intangible values only
in the form of history. It was realised that the relationships between the present activities and past
traditions/patterns in place, with a thorough analysis of the existing life patterns, still maintained the
stories of Istana Jahar, giving attention to ‘memory’ of place as much as its history for the creation of the
place attachment. This is a new mode of place attachment for Istana Jahar. What is lacking in mainly the
intangible cultural values that were attached to the palace when it was a palace that was full of traditions.
A new form of intangible cultural value in the shape of palace history is a new succinct requirement to

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