Singapore’s Futuristic Gardens By The Bay

Background

When I worked at Curiosity, I remember us publishing an article on Gardens by the Bay in Singapore. This otherworldly nature park spans nearly 250 acres with a Cloud Forest, Supertree grove, and a Flower Dome (the largest glass greenhouse in the world). I was most excited to see this on my stopover in Singapore.

Bay is Bae

On the ride there, it’s hard to miss how many trees are in the city of Singapore. They are everywhere. My taxi driver told me that the city has a national “Tree Planting Day” holiday every year on November 7 (this started in 1971!).

Once my driver dropped me off, I made my way into the Flower Dome and was surprised at the temperature. Outside of the greenhouse, the temperature was nearly 90°F, but inside the dome it was in the mid 70s.

There were SO many plants in the greenhouse, seven distinct “gardens” to be exact. In the center of the greenhouse was a giant Japanese garden with pink and white cherry blossom trees.

I left the Flower Dome and scooted into the balmy Cloud Forest next-door. The first thing you see in the Cloud Forest is an enormous waterfall. The waterfall is coming from the top of a giant “mountain” in the center of the dome.

You climb up this mountain through a series of elevators, escalators, and walkways, and then gradually make your way down. Each level has a different theme with the highlight (IMO) being the Secret Garden on the bottom. This area had lots of rare plants and beautiful water features.

Now that I had the domes out of the way, I made my way to the pièce de résistance: Supertree Grove!

These Supertrees are vertical gardens designed to look like trees. In total, there are twelve Supertrees, ranging from 82 feet to 160 feet in height. In the evening, there is a 15-minute light show set to themed music. The light show was striking and one of the coolest things I saw while I was in Singapore.