Gardens by the Bay
At dusk, the Supertrees switch on and the Marina Reservoir goes dark behind them — eighteen steel-and-concrete structures between 25 and 50 metres tall, trailing ferns and bromeliads down their flanks, pulsing through a free light-and-sound show that draws crowds to the grass without a ticket in sight. That moment is a useful lens for all of Gardens by the Bay: a 105-hectare reclaimed-land project that manages, more often than you'd expect, to feel less like infrastructure and more like a living place.
The two cooled conservatories along the reservoir's edge are the headline draw. The Flower Dome replicates a Mediterranean climate across 1.2 hectares — the largest greenhouse in the world as of 2015. The Cloud Forest builds a 35-metre mountain of vegetation inside a single glass shell and drops the world's tallest indoor waterfall down its face. Outside, the Dragonfly and Kingfisher Lakes filter stormwater and host birds. Over 1.5 million plants from every continent except Antarctica are somewhere on the grounds.
💛 What travellers fall for
Return visitors tend to arrive before 10am, when the conservatories are quieter and the light through the Flower Dome glass is still soft. Many skip the OCBC Skyway in favour of the Supertree Observatory — same aerial perspective, in the tallest tree, with a cleaner view. The 19:45 Garden Rhapsody show is free and draws a smaller crowd than the 20:45 one.
How Gardens by the Bay came to be
Gardens by the Bay was announced by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at the 2005 National Day Rally and put to international competition the following January. More than 170 firms from 24 countries entered; two UK practices won — Grant Associates for Bay South, Gustafson Porter for Bay East. Groundbreaking followed in November 2007.
Bay East opened first, in October 2011. Bay South — the 54-hectare core, with the Supertrees and conservatories designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects — opened 29 June 2012. The Supertree Observatory, in the tallest 50-metre tree, came later, opening in December 2019. Bay East closed in 2023 for major redevelopment. By December 2023, the gardens had received their 100 millionth visitor.
Who and what shaped it
People who shaped it
Landmark buildings
See Gardens by the Bay in motion
Plan your visit
On the map
When to go
Singapore sits on the equator, and the midday sun between roughly noon and 4pm makes outdoor exploration genuinely gruelling year-round. November through February brings slightly cooler, more bearable conditions — the best window for the open gardens, though the conservatories offer air-conditioned refuge whenever you need it.
Right now
Background & history adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA) · specs from Wikidata (CC0) · weather from Open-Meteo · map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · photos from Wikimedia Commons / Unsplash with per-image credit. No third-party reviews or social posts reproduced.