Also known as Southern Hotel or Nam Tin, the Great Southern Hotel commenced operations in 1927. Occupying a building named Nam Tin at the junction of Eu Tong Sen Street and Cross Street, it was the first Chinese hotel in Singapore with a lift. Nam Tin was the tallest ...

Chng Seok Tin (b. 6 October 1946, Singapore–d. 6 September 2019, Singapore) was a multiple award-winning artist whose works have been widely showcased in Singapore and abroad. Between 1977 to 2019, she held over 30 solo and 138 group exhibitions. She pursued her ...

The China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) project was launched in 1994 to develop a model industrial township within the city of Suzhou in China’s Jiangsu province. The first flagship joint project between the two governments, a key feature of the SIP involves ...

SPRING (Standards, Productivity and Innovation Board) Singapore, a statutory board under the Ministry of Trade and Industry, was established with the aim of helping Singapore enterprises grow as well as to build trust in Singapore products and services. The agency ...

For much of the early 19th to mid-20th century, technical and vocational education in Singapore was underdeveloped due to the nature of the economy and the colonial government’s noninterference in education. Technical and vocational education gained importance ...

Jurong used to be a mangrove swamp before it was developed into an industrial estate in 1961. Residential and recreational amenities were built in Jurong over the next two decades to attract people to live and work there and to facilitate the expansion of the estate. ...

The Straits Trading Company Limited (STC) was incorporated as a tin-smelting company on 8 November 1887. Its smelter on Pulau Brani was famed for its production of “Straits Tin”, which by the 1900s had become internationally recognised as the purest quality of ...

Trek 2000 International Limited is the Singaporean company that created the ThumbDrive, a thumb-sized universal serial bus (USB) data storage device which revolutionised the way digital data is stored and transferred in personal computers. Headquartered in Singapore’s ...

A household name in Singapore’s retail industry, Metro was first established in Surabaya, Indonesia, in 1953 by Ong Tjoe Kim, a businessman from Indonesia. In 1957, the first Metro store in Singapore opened in a two-storey shophouse at 72 High Street, where The ...

Tan Eng Joo (b. 30 October 1919, Singapore–d. 29 October 2011, Singapore), a Chinese community leader and businessman, was a leading advocate of the Singapore rubber industry during the 1960s and ’70s. In 1964, he and his uncle Tan Lark Sye, together with rubber ...

Henry Nicholas Ridley (CMG) (FRS) (b. 10 December 1855, West Harling, Norfolk, England–d. 24 October 1956, Kew, Surrey, England) is the first director of the Singapore Botanic Gardens from 1888 to 1912. Ridley is also known as the “father of the rubber industry”, ...

National Iron and Steel Mills (NISM) was set up in 1961 as part of Singapore’s development plans. It was the first factory to be built in Jurong Industrial Estate in the 1960s and started by supplying steel to Singapore’s construction industry. It began exporting ...

The Singapore Science Centre opened its doors to the public on 10 December 1977, more than two decades after such a science centre was first envisaged. Built at the cost of S$20 million, the Science Centre was set up to promote interest and learning in science ...

The Industrial Relations Ordinance, 1960, was a piece of legislation that sought to regulate relations between employers and employees in Singapore at a time when the country was embarking on an economic makeover following the institution of self-government in ...

Singapore Technologies (ST) is a group of companies with interests in engineering, technology, infrastructure and lifestyle, property, and financial services. The corporation’s history began with the Chartered Industries of Singapore (CIS), which was established ...

Temasek Holdings is an investment holding company incorporated on 25 June 1974 under the Singapore Companies Act to manage the Singapore government’s investments in government-linked companies (GLCs). Headquartered in Singapore, the company covers a broad spectrum ...

Formal art and music education programmes in Singapore were established by the British colonial government in the 1920s and ’30s respectively. Private Chinese-medium schools also offered art education through courses run by professional artists. After Singapore ...

Hill Street runs from the junction of Victoria Street and Stamford Road and extends to the edge of the Chinatown area. It is one of Singapore’s first roads and derives its name from its close proximity to Government Hill (Fort Canning Hill). The buildings that ...

Fashion designer Ashley Isham, born Eshamuddin Ismail (b. 1979, Singapore–), is one of Singapore’s most prominent figures in the fashion industry. Isham has been based in London since 1996 and his collections are often showcased during London Fashion Week. He once ...

Prima Limited is a Singapore-based company founded in 1961, and has its beginnings in flour milling. The company is now involved in a variety of businesses, such as restaurant management, food manufacturing, information technology and real estate. Prima is known ...