The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands
Like Sands in Macau, Marina Bay Sands in Singapore is a large-scale integrated resort featuring hotels, shopping, dining, a casino, convention and exhibition facilities, performances, and a museum. It also belongs to Las Vegas Sands Corp., which is currently one of the world’s largest casino and hotel operators.
Marina Bay Sands is incredibly famous in Singapore and has become an iconic landmark. Its rooftop infinity pool frequently appears in various media outlets and has become a symbol of Singapore. I’ve visited this place twice. The first time, it started raining as soon as I arrived, so I was stuck inside and could only explore the mall. I could see the ArtScience Museum right next door but couldn’t make it over… My second visit was specifically to tour the museum.
The mall is huge and directly accessible by subway. Despite its size, it has a major drawback: very few places to sit. Aside from restaurants, there are almost no cafes—not even a single chain coffee shop. The only option is the extremely expensive TWG, which doesn’t have any seating for resting either… My legs were absolutely exhausted from walking…
I should mention their membership card here—it offers really great benefits. After registering and verifying your phone number, you can receive a S$5 balance. You can earn points at most stores, typically around 3%, with some restaurants offering up to 9%. These points can be used directly as cash for purchases. You’ll also receive several coupons, and there are discounts on museum tickets as well. It’s extremely worthwhile, so I highly recommend getting a card before you start shopping.
ArtScience Museum
The ArtScience Museum is quite a unique building, designed by Moshe Safdie. It’s said to represent an abstract lotus flower, and real lotuses are planted around its base. Additionally, when it rains, the building collects rainwater that flows down to be reused for restroom facilities.
The museum primarily hosts special exhibitions; the permanent exhibition seems to focus mainly on introducing the museum itself. When I visited, there were three paid exhibitions: Future World, which perfectly fits the theme by combining digital technology with art; Art from the Streets, centered on street art; and Treasures of the Natural World, featuring artificial animal models.
As for tickets, they offer single-exhibition and dual-exhibition options. The dual-exhibition ticket is significantly cheaper than buying two singles, but unfortunately, there isn’t a ticket covering all three exhibitions, so I decided to skip the animal model exhibit.
Future World is an exhibition created by the renowned Japanese tech-art collective teamLab. Many of the exhibits rely heavily on modern technology, including animations, videos, and interactive elements—all executed exceptionally well. The exhibition is divided into four sections: Nature, Town, Park, and Space.
nThe Nature section features almost entirely digital representations of natural scenes, including animals, plants, and waterfalls.
The Town section focuses primarily on visitor interaction. Screens generate corresponding cityscapes based on creations made by visitors. With several different zones, this area is probably kids’ favorite part—it’s said that many children can spend an entire day playing here.
The Park section aims to showcase relaxation and digital entertainment. Colorful balloons continuously change colors, creating a very fun atmosphere.
The Space section feels rather dreamlike. The simulated universe consists of strings of small lights forming an immersive world, enhanced by mirrors along the sides that create a sense of endlessness. Visitors can walk through this space, experiencing various mesmerizing transformations—it’s truly beautiful.
Additionally, another part of this same exhibit is located within the shopping mall. Ticket holders can also enjoy this area downstairs, which is equally popular among children.
Art from the Streets is a more serious art exhibition, without much audience interaction or children present. It primarily showcases the evolution of street art over the past 40 years. Exhibits are carefully selected from large-scale murals, installations, video works, sketches, and archival materials by the most prominent figures in the field. Some street artists even created original pieces directly on the gallery walls. It’s definitely an exhibition worth seeing.
The exhibition is divided into six sections: Pioneers & Masters, Emergence of Messages, World of Stencil Graffiti, New Ways of Writing, Art Born from Necessity, and A More Three-Dimensional Future. I won’t include too many photos here.
Lastly, there’s a free permanent exhibition called Into the Wild, co-created by tech companies such as Google, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Panasonic, and WWF. It features an animated video showcasing the world of wildlife, along with an Android device that transforms the entire museum into a complete forest via AR, allowing visitors to explore within it.
To sum it up… just two words… Money… Both Marina Bay Sands and the ArtScience Museum are absolutely worth visiting.
Photos in this post taken with SONY A5100 + 16-50 f3.5-5.6, post-processed in Lightroom.
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