TROPICAL TOWer

If you love a staycation option with strong eco credentials, try this lofty - and leafy - hotel in the heritage district of Tanjong Pagar.

- BY SHAMUS SILLAR

Oasia Hotel Downtown ranks 37th on the list of Singapore's tallest buildings. And it doesn't look anything like the 36 above it on that list.

First, rather than having a typical façade of blue-grey steel and glass, the building is cloaked in red aluminium. Second, that red aluminium is itself covered in a living vertical garden of lush creepers that spreads all the way up to the 27th storey. In fact, as the plants have grown since the building first opened, it's become increasingly difficult to spot the red bits beneath all the greenery!

It wasn't camouflaged enough for our driver to miss, though. As he pulled into the driveway, I noticed incense smoke rising from a tiny temple across the road, its green-tiled roof flanked by decorative dragons. This is the Seng Wong Beo Temple, which dates back to the 1890s. It's nice to have a slice of history at the front door of a cutting-edge skyscraper - the following morning, it would be our first stop on an epic ride around Tanjong Pagar, Chinatown and Marina Bay on a set of the hotel's in-house bicycles.

Settling in