It’s that time of the year again, where Singapore’s downtown district becomes even more dazzling than usual. Singapore Night Festival 2026 (SNF 2026) is here, with breathtaking projection shows, plenty of art displays and sculptures that are as meaningful as they are mesmerising, and photo ops galore.
Before the festivities kick off tonight, 21st August, we’ve sussed out the best experiences and displays you should catch.
There are 4 festival zones for you to check out, spanning the entire Bras Basah.Bugis (BBB) district. We’re talking everything from Fort Canning to Bugis, with the Raffles City, Bencoolen, and Dhoby Ghaut areas captured within.
It’s an ambitious itinerary if you’re planning to course through every event highlight in a single evening, so we’d recommend splitting it up over multiple nights to give each exhibit the time and attention it deserves.
Otherwise, you can go on curated walking trails which the SNF team has put together, with route timings indicated.
Birdmen
No, you’ve not wandered into an alternate-universe dreamscape – Birdmen is a roving performance by Dutch theatre company Close-Act Theatre, featuring enormous illuminated, prehistoric-looking creatures operated by performers on stilts.
Making their Southeast Asian debut at SNF 2026, these otherworldly beings will roam through the festival district twice a night for just 3 days. They’ll start from the National Museum of Singapore before making their way through spots including Armenian Street, The Cathay, SOTA, and Queen Street – so keep looking up as you explore.
Date: 21st Aug-23rd Aug
Time: 7.45pm, 9.15pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Starting from National Museum of Singapore
The crowning jewel of every Singapore Night Festival, this year’s projection mapping display showcase is titled Tales Of Earth & Sea. Cast upon the National Museum of Singapore’s facade is a colourful and rousing telling of local folklore.
Our nation’s history, myths, and legends are brought to life in this awe-inspiring display, amplified by an original soundtrack.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: 7.30pm-12am
Admission: Free
Venue: National Museum of Singapore
The National Museum isn’t the only building getting an after-dark makeover. MALAM is SNF’s first-ever projection mapping competition, turning The Cathay’s iconic facade into a canvas for digital artists from around Southeast Asia.
The competition received close to 50 submissions, with the top 20 works lighting up the building during the first half of the festival. If you’re swinging by from 29th August, you’ll still be able to catch the 5 winning works, so there’s good reason to visit twice if projection mapping is your thing.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: The Cathay
Take a second to pause at You and I, Believing…, a large blooming flower sculpture that’s a beacon in the night. The structure is given movement by fluttering yellow ribbons that viewers are invited to tie on, bringing to mind that classic song to tie a yellow ribbon ‘round the old oak tree.
Created by the Yellow Ribbon Community Arts Festival Committee 2026, the installation invites you to look closer at its reflective core on one side, with photographs on the other. Just like the hit song, the installation seeks to inspire everyone to reconsider their stands on first impressions, and reflect on identity, empathy, community, and second chances.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: SMU Campus Green
There’s the Rosetta Stone, and then we’ve got the Singapore Stone, our very own ancient sandstone fragment with an undeciphered inscription that you may or may not have heard of. Well, the digital artwork Traces takes inspo from those very inscriptions, using them as a starting point to explore the fragments of history that survive even when their original meanings are lost.
It also nods to Singapore’s early connections with regional trade and cultural exchange, making this one of the more contemplative stops along the festival route where you can sit in the amphitheatre of SMU Campus Green to bask in these projections.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: SMU Campus Green
If your parents or grandparents have ever sworn that putting chillies outside will stop the rain, Plant Chilli Then No Rain! takes that superstition and blows it up into larger-than-life proportions.
You can’t miss the oversized glowing chillies and onions at the Reflection Pool outside Bras Basah MRT Station. It’s a cheeky take on the familiar old wives’ tale of leaving these ingredients outdoors to keep wet weather at bay, while also prompting us to think about the beliefs and traditions that have been passed down through the generations.
Date: 1st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Reflection Pool @ Bras Basah MRT Station
Horror buffs will be thrilled by the vintage film screenings happening at Oldham Theatre, located within the National Archives of Singapore building. It’s your chance to check out a curated series of horror flicks said to be from the golden age of cinema across Southeast Asia.
One of the movies that will be screened is Tiger Stripes, which won the Critics’ Week Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
Not only will you be scared silly, your moviegoing experience will be brought to the next level with special post-screening showcases highlighting behind-the-scenes factoids.
Get tickets for Horror Nights @ Oldham Theatre
Date: 22nd-23rd Aug, 29th-30th Aug, 5th Sep
Time: 7.30pm-9pm
Admission: $10 per screening
Venue: Oldham Theatre
Fort Canning Hill is about to get even spookier after dark with The Lost Legacy of Fort Canning: The Forbidden Hill, a 70-minute guided night walk into the myths and mysteries surrounding the former Bukit Larangan, AKA The Forbidden Hill.
Instead of being your usual heritage tour, the experience combines archaeology with atmospheric soundscapes and live traditional Malay dance, inviting you to join in as a participant, not just a spectator.
Along the way, you’ll delve into the rise and fall of 14th-century Singapura, tales of buried treasure, the freshwater spring that once supported settlements in the area, and even the mystery surrounding an ancient sacred shrine.
Get tickets for The Lost Legacy of Fort Canning: The Forbidden Hill
Date: 21st-22nd Aug, 27th-29th Aug, 3rd-5th Sep
Time: Thu 8pm | Fri-Sat 7.30pm, 9.30pm
Admission: $60
Venue: Fort Canning Hill
At Inter-Light, you actually get to become part of the artwork, which combines changing lights, moving imagery and animated shadow projections inspired by traditional street performances and communal myth-making.
Visit during the day to see the installation’s shifting colours; animated projections bring it to life come nightfall, and you get to play with the projections too, to contribute your movements and shadows to an ever-changing tale.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Raffles City
Get a crash course on CHIJMES’ architectural past at Textures Through Time, which is projected across the building’s exterior.
The projection takes you through different periods of the building through textures and visual language, starting with woven materials reminiscent of early kampongs, progressing to more modern CRT displays, before imagining the years ahead with futuristic bioluminescence.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: CHIJMES
A Walk Through Mythical Singapore transforms Stamford Walkway into 3 fantastical realms – Sea, Land, and Sky – populated by characters and creatures from familiar local legends.
Journey underwater with the swordfish from The Legend of Redhill and the giant tortoise which is said to have formed Kusu Island, before heading onto land in the footsteps of Sang Nila Utama and his legendary lion. Look overhead too, where creatures including garudas and Chinese dragons take over the “Sky” portion of the trail.
Date: 1st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Stamford Walkway
Look up as you walk past Stamford Place – Wandering Spirits Abound is another projection mapping display that you’ll catch, reimagining the myths of Singapore’s past through the creatures of legend – including the elusive Monkey Man and Pulau Ubin’s fabled animals – as custodians of the land.
Incorporating Peranakan and batik motifs, the digital animations nod to the Armenian Street identity as a hub for craft and design.
Date: 1st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Stamford Place Clock Tower
If admiring everyone else’s art has got your creative juices flowing, you can make some of your own at the Neon Glow Art Jamming sessions on CHIJMES Mini Lawn.
You’ll settle into an outdoor, picnic-style setup for an art jamming sesh using fluorescent neon colours, with the choice of either a 30cm x 40cm canvas or a mini sling bag to take home. Art materials are all provided, and each participant gets complimentary neon face or arm painting too.
The one-hour sessions, starting each hour from 7pm, are beginner-friendly and open to all, so this works just as well for a family night out as it does for a colourful date-night activity.
Get tickets for Neon Glow Art Jamming & Colour Blast Party
Date: 21st-22nd Aug, 27th-29th Aug, 3rd-5th Sep
Time: 7pm-10pm
Admission: $44
Venue: CHIJMES
The Blooming Hearts Fortune Merlion is an adorably patriotic reimagination of the maneki-neko, or prosperity cat as most of us know it. Besides being a cute photo op, the mechanical sculpture, standing at 2.8m tall, is actually made sustainably and bears a deeper meaning to Singapore’s history.
The Merlion is our country’s official mascot, there’s no doubt about that. But this particular sculpture also alludes to the OG Merlion’s location: Singapore River, which was once majorly polluted before the modernisation of national sanitation systems.
As a tribute to how far Singapore has come in the journey to becoming a clean and green Garden City, 50% of the Fortune Merlion is made out of recycled PET bottle flakes.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: Plaza Singapura
You’ve probably walked through Bras Basah countless times without realising that Sungai Bras Basah, a tidal stream, once flowed beneath parts of the area.
When The Water Rose retraces the historic waterway on a 2-hour immersive walking experience, taking you through 4 sections around the district. Instead of simply hearing about the area’s past, this multi-sensory journey pairs the stories and hidden mythology of each stop with a site-specific live performance.
There’s even a specially crafted non-alcoholic drink waiting for you at each stop, adding a literal taste of the experience as you follow the river that has since disappeared beneath our modern city.
Get tickets for When The Water Rose
Date: 22nd Aug, 29th Aug, 5th Sep
Time: 7.30pm-9.30pm
Admission: $35
Venue: Meet at Temasek Shophouse drop-off point (Handy Road)
Photo-worthiness aside, Stormy Straits tells the tale of how Bugis seafarers back in the 1800s braved treacherous waters and hazardous monsoon winds to make a living.
The glowing cloud-like sculptures, coupled with moving shadow projections, signify the stormy conditions which sailors of yesteryear had to navigate. There are also interactive elements to the sculpture, such as illuminated platforms for guests to “seek refuge” from the crowd, similar to how conquerors of Singapore’s maritime history would sail towards lighthouses to escape the elements.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: 7.30pm-12am
Admission: Free
Venue: Bugis Street Art Lane
Round up the kiddos and head straight for Lovebug, a whimsical inflatable world by local creative studio ART-ZOO. The installation draws inspiration from Singapore’s native flora, fauna and folklore, with colourful interpretations of the endangered Raffles’ Banded Langur, giant saga seeds, rafflesia, nutmeg and more scattered around the space.
Do note that you can only sit on the 2 red, polka-dotted flowers on the edges of the exhibit. You can pose with the langurs taking centrestage, but don’t be tempted to climb on and hug them.
Date: 21st Aug-5th Sep
Time: Fri-Sat 7.30pm-12am | Sun-Thu 7.30pm-11pm
Admission: Free
Venue: National Library Building Plaza
This guide has definitely not covered everything that’s on offer in this year’s edition of Singapore Night Festival. It’s a real treat – not just visually, but also mentally stimulating, with enough to see that you might need more than one night to cover it all.
Photography by: Hui Wen Chan
Cover image adapted from: Singapore Night Festival
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