Discover Colombo’s hottest stays, sights, shopping and more

After the political upheaval last year, Sri Lanka has bounced back, and it’s time for a visit to Colombo. A seaside city with a flourishing heritage scene, Colombo is the perfect start (or end) to any Sri Lankan holiday. The capital was built on, and is home to some postcard-perfect colonial-era monuments – and of course, famous residences and buildings by its most famous architect, Geoffrey Bawa.

A city that is constantly transforming, parts of Colombo are now gentrifying with new upscale shopping hubs, high-rise developments and a swanky port city. Add to this the multicultural neighbourhoods teeming with temples, mosques, churches and buzzing markets with fresh produce.

Here’s our lowdown on the very best that Colombo has to offer – as well as a few getaways just beyond.

Where to stay in and around Colombo

Jetwing Colombo Seven

Right by the tree-lined stretch of Ward Place and just two streets from Viharamahadevi Park stands Jetwing Colombo Seven, the local hotel brand’s metropolitan addition with deluxe rooms, studios and apartments that offer city views. Its restobar Ward 7 sits by the hotel’s rooftop infinity pool and serves island-influenced nibbles like devilled pork marinated with chilli, deep-fried and mixed with curry. If you’re looking for a feel of the city’s local nightlife, ask the concierge about the hotel’s cheekily named “Dodgy Bar Tour”.

Jetwing Colombo Seven

De Saram House

Legendary Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa has given the island many stunning public buildings and luxury hotels, the latter often booked up months in advance. But Tropical Modernism fans short on time (and funds) can snag a night or two at this bed and breakfast in the heart of Colombo. Bawa renovated it as a private home for renowned Sri Lankan concert pianist Druvi de Saram in 1986, and it’s currently maintained by the Geoffrey Bawa Trust. Spacious and characterful rooms aside, the highlights of the gracefully aging property are its clay-coloured courtyard and the art-filled piano room (request a tour from the property manager).

Photo: De Saram House

Cape Weligama

A two-hour drive south from Colombo, passing the heritage city of Galle, Cape Weligama is a Relais & Chateaux resort that delivers breathtaking views at every turn. Enjoy a vista of the Indian Ocean with your made-to-order breakfast at Ocean Terrace, reflect on the waves from the infinity-style Half Moon Pool or soak up the sunset light on the surf over a private dinner from one of the viewpoints. The villas – named after historic explorers – come with enormous bathrooms, dressing rooms and mod-cons such as top-notch Bluetooth speakers. Depending on the season, the waters around Weligama are also ideal for surfing and whale-watching, which the hotel will be glad to arrange.

Photo: Cape Weligama

Photo: Cape Weligama

Where to eat in Colombo

Nuga Gama

Rice and curry are staples of Sri Lankan cuisine, and Nuga Gama offers an authentic place to try it. Set around a 200-year-old banyan tree inside the luxe city hotel Cinnamon Grand, this rustic restaurant only open for dinner creates a Sri Lankan village feel with its in-house organic farm, kerosene lanterns and women chefs dishing up classic Sri Lankan fare passed down through the generations. The restaurant’s live stations dish up classic Sri Lankan street food like appam, or egg hoppers (bowl-shaped snacks topped with an egg) and kottu roti (chopped flatbread mashed with vegetables, egg and a meat of your choice).

Photo: Nuga Gama Colombo

Monsoon

Well-placed on the vibrant entertainment street of Park Street Mews, Monsoon is the place to go to for a taste of Southeast Asia. The lunch menu offers classic plates like nasi lemak (coconut rice served with spicy chili paste, anchovies, peanuts and boiled egg) and pad thai (stir-fried rice noodles) while dinner features Malaysian tauhu bakar, grilled crispy tofu plated with mango salad. There’s also a selection of local spirits like Rockland gin and arrack. The fine-dining venue’s high ceilings and chic decor make it a prime date spot.

Baked Pumpkin & Custard Cake with Honey. Photo: Monsoon

Monsoon's Chicken Satay. Photo: Monsoon

Where to drink in Colombo

Uncle’s

One of several hotspots along the pedestrian-only Park Street Mews – where Colombo’s well-dressed hipsters congregate – Uncle’s stands out with its retro-chic signage and interiors, DJ nights and classic cocktails with Sri Lankan twists. The Amba Martini features mango and spices, while the Kolompuré Manhattan sees rye whiskey replaced with arrack and the vermouth infused with cardamom and nutmeg. The bar bites are also standouts – cancel your dinner plans and order hearty “short eats” such as the lamb rolls and cheese toast.

Photo: Uncle’s

Smoke & Bitters

Ranked #42 by Asia’s 50 Best Bars, Smoke & Bitters is well worth the two hours’ drive along the Southern Expressway from Colombo. It’s a charming spot within a coconut garden in the country’s latest surf town Hiriketiya, and the cocktail list is all about championing island spirits and local ingredients. Drinks include rum cocktails blended with sundried stoneapple flower and arrack paired with banana peel and smoked wild bee honey. The equally outstanding smokehouse menu offers pulled pork, smoked jackfruit and chargrilled barramundi.

Photo: Smoke & Bitters

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Colombo

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What to do in Colombo

A quick online search would turn up sights the likes of Colombo Fort, Seema Malaka Lake Temple and Jami Ul-Alfar Masjid (also known as the Red Mosque) as must-see attractions when visiting Colombo. But here are a couple of stops that, in our humble opinion, are not to be missed – especially for the heritage and art enthusiast.

Gangaramaya Temple

Boasting an extensive collection of artefacts, this sacred Buddhist temple located close to Beira Lake was established 120 years ago. Two Buddha statues guard the temple’s wooden door entrance, which features intricate traditional-style elephant and swan carvings. The in-house museum showcases antiques such as sculptures of Hindu gods, vintage coins and watches. Then there’s the country’s smallest Buddha statue housed in a glass box, only viewed by a magnifying glass. Remember to dress modestly when you visit.

Photo: Shutterstock

Saskia Fernando Gallery

This contemporary gallery – the first of its kind in Colombo – spotlights the works of young local artists and island natives. Since it opened in 2009, this independently-run space has helped elevate Colombo’s art scene with exhibitions throughout the year. Featured artists include Firi Rahman and Shaanea Mendis, whose works both explore the relationship between man and nature in different ways.

Photo: Saskia Fernando Gallery

Where to shop in Colombo

Paradise Road

Paradise Road is among the most renowned homeware and decor brands in Colombo. Their flagship store opposite Viharamahadevi Park sells a curated collection of handicrafts, antiques and hand-painted crockery, crafted by skilled artisans from cottage industries across Sri Lanka. Other items on offer include batik napkins, table runners, scented candles and quirky door stoppers. An in-store cafe serves coffee and great cakes.

Photo: Paradise Road

Urban Island

The neighbourhood surrounding Viharamhadevi Park continues to attract trendy, upmarket retail stores. And everything at Urban Island is a conscious nod to the slow, tropical life of Sri Lanka. This lively concept store deals in handmade cushion covers made using heritage techniques, cane furniture and jute rugs. Don’t miss its planters made with sundried palmyrah palm leaves, dyed and hand-woven into intricate designs by women in Sri Lanka’s north.

Photo: Urban Island

For our full list on things to do and places to see in Colombo, check out our Colombo City Guide. For more information on Singapore Airlines flights to Colombo, visit the official website. 

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Singapores young farmers are starting a food revolution

A ferocious morning sun beats down on the Sky Sprouts rooftop garden in Bukit Timah, a lush, upscale residential area deep in central Singapore. Farmer Benjamin Ang enters his greenhouse, followed by his beloved Shetland sheepdog Natsuki. He reaches down to pluck a beefsteak tomato and offers it up to us. One bite yields tart, juicy goodness.

“In our culture, meat is always considered to be superior, but every plant has its own strength and story,” says the 34-year-old founder of specialty fruit and vegetable producer Natsuki’s Garden. “My hope is that my produce can inspire emotions… nourish the soul as much as the body.”

Armed with a degree in horticultural sciences, Farmer Ben – as he’s known – has also worked at Singapore’s National Parks Board for six years and has experience as a horticulture consultant. It’s no surprise that he has gained something of a reputation locally and internationally as an innovator in urban sustainable farming. 

Benjamin Ang with his Shetland Natsuki, as he shows off the shishito pepper he grew. Photo: Toh Ee Ming

Juicy beefsteak tomatoes from Natsuki's Garden. Photo: Toh Ee Ming

An avid tinkerer, he codes his own electronic controls. He also uses 3D modelling and printing to make custom components for his cutting-edge farming equipment. Realising that most traditional horticultural structures are designed for temperate climates, he created an innovative V-shaped roof for his garden’s greenhouses, which allows hot air to escape quickly and maintains ideal temperatures in Singapore’s tropical heat.

Natsuki’s Garden produces heirloom and speciality herbs and vegetables that are hard to source at a high quality in Singapore – such as cherry and beefsteak tomatoes, melons, cucumbers, aubergines, Japanese turnips, beetroots, carrots, Jerusalem artichokes and Japanese mountain yams. These are sold to the public on site and also to local private chefs and omakase restaurants, such as Province and Kausmo.

Making farming fun, cool and accessible

In 2019, Singapore announced its “30 by 30” goal to meet 30 percent of its nutritional needs locally by 2030, up from less than 10 per cent today. With lack of farmland in the city-state and a huge reliance on imported food, there is an urgency to grow for more self-sufficiency, through modern techniques such as vertical farming, hydroponics and aeroponics. 

This has inspired a community movement, with rooftop gardens, community farms and vertical green spaces popping up around Singapore. One of these is City Sprouts, the social enterprise behind Sky Sprouts – where Farmer Ben has his rooftop garden – which transforms under-utilised urban locations into green, vibrant, inclusive spaces.

City Sprouts’ urban farm at the former Henderson Secondary School. Photo: City Sprouts

Its first urban farm was created in an old secondary school in the residential Redhill district in central Singapore. After Sky Sprouts, a third farm, Life Sprouts, was created at Punggol East in May 2023. 

“City Sprouts is all about bringing the farm closer to people in the city, especially for those who live in high-rise apartments,” says the organisation’s co-founder Simone Lim.

City Sprouts spreads its message – and produce – with farmers’ markets, farm-to-table dinners, film screenings and wellness activities for green-conscious visitors and residents. It has a network of 70 community farmers, agritech startups and agripreneurs.

Harnessing technology for sustainable fish farming

In the rolling countryside around Sungei Tengah where few tourists venture, fish such as barramundi, Queensland groupers, dragon tiger groupers, red snappers and vannamei shrimps are being produced at one of Singapore’s few land-based fish farms, Atlas Aquaculture.

Husband-and-wife team Kane Mcguinn from Australia and Singaporean Victoria Yoong typify Singapore’s new generation of sustainable food producers. Curious, energetic and creative, the couple met during the building of the SEA Aquarium – Yoong was part of the project management team while Mcguinn was the design consultant. Food security had become a hot topic during the pandemic, and the pair believed they could make a difference.

Atlas Aquaculture’s Kane Mcguinn and Victoria Yoong. Photo: Atlas Aquaculture

Many of Singapore’s sea-based farms along the coast are at the mercy of the environment, algae bloom, oil spills due to vessel collisions and low dissolved oxygen levels in water. Some land-based farms truck in sea water, which is costly and polluted. They felt compelled to build and engineer an entirely different and self-sufficient system. 

“Traditional farming is so far in the past,” says Mcguinn, “so even making small tweaks can be a really big change.” Atlas is looking to revolutionise fish farming by exploring new, more sustainable materials, and experimenting with nanobubble technology to reduce harmful chemical use. A closed-loop system recycles and reuses 100 per cent of water used at the farm. 

The same attributes that start-ups and big tech firms like Amazon and Google are looking for, we’re looking for as well

Yoong says this high-tech approach is the future: “Farming isn’t just about menial labour. You need to be open-minded, flexible, have some understanding of math, science, technology… the same attributes that start-ups and big tech firms like Amazon and Google are looking for, we’re looking for as well.”

And they’re finding this talent locally. The farm operations team has four young farmers and two interns with backgrounds in animal studies, pharmaceutical science, building and construction. 

Queensland Grouper at feeding time. Photo: Toh Ee Ming

After navigating bureaucratic red tape, struggling for funding and fighting misconceptions about the superiority of wild-caught versus farmed fish, Mcguinn and Yoong are finding success. They currently supply their fish to popular seafood restaurant Jumbo Seafood and premium lifestyle destination Resorts World Sentosa. Visitors can also sample Atlas’ catch at restaurants by the Les Amis group, which runs some of Singapore’s most coveted eateries including their eponymous three-Michelin starred restaurant. 

A multisensorial experience at a rooftop bee farm

The future of food security is in large part dependent on the fate of bees, whose populations are dwindling due to the use of harmful agricultural chemicals, climate change and habitat loss. Educating people about the importance of bees is the inspiration behind The Sundowner – Nature Experience Space, a rooftop farm created by seasoned entrepreneur and urban farmer Clarence Chua. 

Perched above a conserved shophouse in the charming eastern neighbourhood of Siglap, the space is filled with the fragrance of sage, rosemary, laksa leaves and Thai basil. Here, Chua offers rooftop farming, pizza-making, cocktail appreciation and terrarium-making workshops, but the real stars here are the bees.

The Sundowner's Clarence Chua, feeding the bees. Photo: Toh Ee Ming

Hungry bees at The Sundowner. Photo: Toh Ee Ming

Guests can don protective suits to observe the hives of Asian honey bees, red dwarf honeybees and stingless bees and learn all about them – how they fan their wings to cool down the temperature within their hives and huddle together for warmth, and how their favourite plants are calliandra and coral vine. Then everyone gets to participate in a honey-tasting session to appreciate the tastes, textures and colours of honey from all around the world.

Worldly and articulate, Chua’s goal is to educate the public about these insects’ invaluable role in pollinating the world’s food crops. “We want to show urban dwellers that everything is connected in nature: when healthy plants get pollinated by bees, they bear healthy and nutritious fruits and flowers for us to eat.”

Inter-generational evolution in farming 

There’s room for traditional farmers in Singapore’s food production revolution too, such as second-generation farmer Toh Ying Ying. She was born the same year in which her father, Alan Toh, founded his farm. While other children made sandcastles at the beach, Toh and her younger brother Zheng Jie were building soil castles in the fields.

The patriarch’s passion for vegetables has helped their business, Yili Farm at Lim Chu Kang in the northern reaches of Singapore, become one of Singapore’s leading local vegetable producers. Yili supplies major supermarket chains like FairPrice and Sheng Siong, and also sells through online platforms like Amazon Fresh and Redmart.

The Tohs of Yili Farm. Photo: Yili Farm

In 2019 Alan Toh was told the lease on his land wouldn’t be renewed, so the rest of the family decided to pitch in, learning everything from germination, harvesting and packing to liaising with distributors and suppliers. “We have a lot of deep feelings about the farm,” explains the younger Toh. 

Now, they’re moving to a new, bigger site at Neo Tiew. With this move, they’ll be exploring greater sustainability measures too, such as a mix of growing in soil, indoor farming and hydroponics. They also plan to open the farm to the public for weekend markets and educational tours.

Fostering new careers in farming

Encouraging a new generation of Singaporeans to become involved in modern farming is a major inspiration for Natsuki Garden’s Benjamin Ang. He educates fellow producers, such as Artisan Green – an indoor farm in Kallang, where Ang works as head of horticulture – but also the public, about the complexity involved in farming in Singapore.

With high-tech farming still in its infancy, Singapore lacks access to many technologies that other food-producing nations have, so solutions need to be built from the ground up, he says. “Growing vegetables is easy. Growing vegetables in a way that is economically viable, in a country with sky-high labour costs – that’s extremely difficult.”

As schools encourage and explore new career paths in this field, City Sprouts is doing its part to help sow seeds of interest in the younger generation. Most recently, the team helped judge a “farm-a-thon”, where local students across Singapore proposed solutions for the country’s food security challenges.

Aquaculturists Yoong and Mcguinn, too, hope to spread the word about their innovative approach: “We want to show everything: the bad, the good, the ugly. We need to take active steps for future generations to understand more about the food they eat,” says Yoong.

For Toh, the message is much simpler: nothing beats the taste of your own vegetables. “They just taste sweeter!”

Where to have a taste of local farm produce 

Les Amis – Three-Michelin-starred French haute cuisine helmed by Chef Sebastien Lepinoy. 

Jumbo Seafood – Award-winning seafood restaurant that’s beloved by locals for its chilli crab. 

Province – Newly opened eight-seater serving contemporary Southeast Asian cuisine, nestled in the trendy Joo Chiat neighbourhood. Province prides itself on limiting each dish to five ingredients. 

Kausmo – Sustainability-minded 16-seater dining concept that prioritises reducing food waste. 

Experience Singapore’s farms 

City Sprouts – A food and social hub in suburban southern Singapore which organises activities such as farm tours, farm-to-table lunches as well as other activities such as rooftop yoga. 

The Sundowner – A charming rooftop garden on the eastside of Singapore that offers urban farming experiences alongside other fun activities such as cocktail-mixing and pizza-making. 

To learn more about Singapore Airlines’ flight service to Singapore, visit the official website.

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LoveLotsDiamond

Located in the heart of the Orchard Road shopping belt, LoveLotsDiamond has cracked the code for stunning yet affordable jewellery. The team’s passion for 100% natural diamonds and gemstones is made possible by trusted gemstone suppliers, and allows them to provide clients with the best possible prices. Guided by expert staff, you’ll find a well-curated selection of rings, earrings, pendants and lots else, featuring not only diamonds but also other precious stones such as rubies and sapphires, as well as semi-precious gemstones such as amethyst and lemon citrine. Styles range from the quirky and contemporary 18K gold lemon citrine sapphire bee ring to a timeless white gold tennis bracelet featuring 20 eight-carat diamonds.

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Taj Palace

Set amidst tranquil gardens in a leafy South Delhi neighbourhood, The Taj Palace has been the city’s luxury address for decades. With diverse dining options and the elegant poolside Blue Bar, plus relaxing therapies on offer at the J Wellness Circle, there are plenty of options to wind down right on the premises.

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Haveli Dharampura

Set in the heart of the old city, this charming boutique stay features 14 carefully restored room in a 200-year-old traditional haveli, or mansion. The luxurious property is a step back in time to the Mughal era, filled with elaborate woodwork and antique furniture. Their restaurant, Lakhori, specialises in the traditional cuisine of Old Delhi, offering classic street food dishes like chaat (a type of Indian savoury snack) as well as hearty Mughlai kebabs and curries in an upscale setting.

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