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Independent shops locals cross town for. No mall chains, all character.
Record crates up shophouse stairs, a tea merchant from the 1920s, perfume oils blended to order and bookshops run by people who read. Small shops change hands and hours often, and many close one day midweek, so check before you go.
Kampong Glam · $$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Mon–Thu 10:00–21:00; Fri 10:00–22:00 (paused 12:45–14:00 for prayers); Sat 09:00–22:00; Sun 09:00–21:00
Shelves of Islamic history, philosophy and Sufi writing on the street that frames Sultan Mosque. Upstairs hides a second bookshop.
It pauses for Friday prayers from 12:45 to 14:00, so plan around that. Ask at the counter for a pick if the shelves overwhelm.
Kampong Glam · $$$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A carefully picked crate-dig on North Bridge Road: pop, rock and classics, even anime soundtracks, with new pressings beside used finds.
Guides list it as closed on Mondays, so check before you go. Records travel best flat in hand luggage, not in the hold.
Kampong Glam · $$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A bright little record shop on Haji Lane that leans current: new pop pressings up front, cheap crates for the patient digger.
Haji Lane wakes around noon, so come after lunch with a coffee from Alchemist on Arab Street. Ask for records to be bagged flat.
Kampong Glam · $$ · MRT Lavender (EW11)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A loud little shop tucked in an old textile mall, stocking local, regional and international punk, hardcore, metal and emo records.
Guides list afternoon hours on four days a week only, so check its socials first. Pack records flat in your hand luggage.
Kampong Glam · $$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Daily 12:00–21:00
Racks of vintage pieces and reworked one-offs, many made from offcuts. The sister shop, Superwasted, is a few doors down at 16 Haji Lane.
Open daily from noon. Try on everything: sizes are all over the place, and each piece is one of one.
Kampong Glam · $$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Hours unknown, check before you go
An upstairs thrift shop on Haji Lane filled with secondhand clothes shipped in from Japan, kept deliberately cheap.
Up the stairs at 19 Haji Lane. Guides list it as shut on Mondays and Tuesdays, so aim for later in the week with an empty tote.
Kampong Glam · $$$ · MRT Nicoll Highway (CC5)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A collector's den since the early 1990s: enamel signs, tiffin carriers, vintage soft-drink bottles and old postcards, all with a story.
Guides list afternoon opening only. Postcards and old tins are the packable buys; ask the price before you fall in love.
Kampong Glam · $$$ · MRT Bugis (EW12/DT14)
Daily 10:00–17:00 walk-in; 17:00–20:00 by appointment
A small perfumery of small-batch perfume oils, candles and incense, with consultations and workshops to blend a scent of your own.
Walk in before 17:00; evenings are by appointment. Perfume oils in small bottles slip easily into a hand-luggage liquids bag.
Bras Basah · $$$ · MRT Bras Basah (CC2)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A cramped, much-loved unit on level 4 of Bras Basah Complex, packed with design, typography, architecture and art books.
Take the lift to level 4 and give yourself an hour. Big art books are heavy: ask about posting them rather than packing them.
Selegie · $$ · MRT Bencoolen (DT21)
Hours unknown, check before you go
One of Singapore's pioneering comic shops, in the basement of an old-school mall, with racks of comics and graphic novels.
Hunting for a back issue? Write down the series and number before you go. Pair with Basheer at Bras Basah, a short walk away.
Bencoolen · $$$ · MRT Rochor (DT13)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A ground-floor record shop in Burlington Square on Bencoolen Street. Easy to walk past, and that is half the fun of finding it.
Five minutes on foot from Bugis and Sim Lim Square. Bring the list of albums you keep meaning to buy and ask at the counter.
Little India · $$ · MRT Jalan Besar (DT22)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A secondhand clothing shop at the foot of a public-housing block between Little India and Jalan Besar. Off the tourist track, on purpose.
Guides list it as shut on Mondays and Tuesdays; weekend afternoons are safest. Little India's sari and spice lanes are close.
Civic District · $$$ · MRT City Hall (EW13/NS25)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A long-standing record shop on the second floor of Excelsior Shopping Centre, one of the older malls in the Peninsula cluster.
Guides list afternoon-only hours. Cathay Photo and Aesthetic Bay in The Adelphi are a minute away, so do the three together.
Civic District · $$$ · MRT City Hall (EW13/NS25)
Daily 10:00–22:00
A Singapore leather and stationery brand that personalises notebooks, cardholders and wallets in store. Its flagship is this atelier.
Open till 22:00, steps from City Hall MRT. Allow time for personalising, and ask about designing your own upcycled leather piece.
Civic District · $$$ · MRT City Hall (EW13/NS25)
Daily 11:00–20:00
A Singapore furniture and homeware label that mixes Art Deco Shanghai with clean modern lines. The small pieces are the ones to carry home.
Upstairs in the Raffles Arcade. Big furniture needs shipping, so ask before you commit; trays and cushions fit a suitcase.
Civic District · $$$$ · MRT City Hall (EW13/NS25)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A fountain pen specialist with Japanese, German and Italian pens, bottled inks and accessories. Ask to try a nib before you buy.
Bottled ink counts as a liquid: keep it in checked bags. Retrophonic's Adelphi counter is on the same floor.
Civic District · $$$$ · MRT City Hall (EW13/NS25)
Mon–Sat 11:00–19:00; closed Sun & public holidays
The flagship of a Singapore camera retailer founded in 1959, with cameras, lenses and accessories and staff who know them.
Closed Sundays and public holidays. Ask about tourist refunds on big buys, and keep the receipt and box handy at the airport.
Orchard · $ · MRT Orchard (NS22/TE14)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A dying breed: a secondhand bookshop holding on at the fifth floor of Far East Plaza, minutes from the glossy end of Orchard Road.
Allow time to browse; used stock turns over, so buy it when you see it. A cheap paperback is the best long-haul flight upgrade.
Chinatown · $$ · MRT Outram Park (EW16/NE3/TE17)
Mon & Wed–Sat 12:00–20:00; Sun 12:00–18:00; closed Tue
Mostly Chinese books, with a sharp English shelf of Singapore titles, in a shophouse on leafy Bukit Pasoh Road just off Keong Saik.
Closed Tuesdays and opens at noon. Two minutes from Outram Park MRT, so it is an easy first stop before the Duxton bookshops.
Chinatown · $$$ · MRT Clarke Quay (NE5)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A ground-floor curio shop in an old Chinatown office block, worth a look for vintage collectibles you will not find in a souvenir lane.
Guides list daytime hours only. Ask for bubble wrap: anything ceramic or glass should travel in your hand luggage.
Chinatown · $$ · MRT Chinatown (NE4/DT19)
Mon–Sat 08:30–18:30
A tea merchant running since the 1920s, known for strong Nanyang-style blends of the kind poured with bak kut teh. Teapots and caddies too.
Ask for their Nanyang-style blend in a paper packet: light, cheap and it packs flat. It also ships worldwide if you over-buy.
Chinatown · $ · MRT Chinatown (NE4/DT19)
Mon–Sat 10:00–16:30; closed Sun & public holidays
A spice stall where Anthony Leow, 40 years in the trade, mixes blends and rubs for Singapore dishes. Buy the mix for a dish you ate here.
Up on level 3 of People's Park Food Centre, closed Sundays. Sealed packs go in checked bags; check your home country's food rules.
Chinatown · $$ · MRT Chinatown (NE4/DT19)
Daily 09:00–20:00
Drawers of dried herbs, jars of medicated oils and balms, soup packs and bird's nest, in a hall that has served Chinatown for over 60 years.
Medicated oils and herbal soup packs are light gifts. Ask staff which balm does what before you buy three of everything.
Chinatown · $ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Hours unknown, check before you go
Joss paper, paper houses, paper phones and even paper sports cars, made to be burnt for ancestors. A window into a living ritual.
Look and ask, but be respectful: these are offerings, not novelties. Small items are sold for real use, not as souvenirs.
Tanjong Pagar · $$ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Mon–Thu 09:30–19:00; Fri–Sat 09:30–22:00; Sun 09:30–18:00
Shelves of SingLit and Asian authors, a short café menu with scones and prosecco, and author talks some evenings. Quiet enough to read in.
Open till 22:00 on Fridays and Saturdays, so it works as a calm pre-dinner stop. Buy a local novel and start it over tea.
Tanjong Pagar · $$ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Hours unknown, check before you go
Two floors of fiction, non-fiction, travel and children's books in a Duxton shophouse, picked by people who clearly read them.
Retrophonic Records is next door and Book Bar is round the corner: do all three in one easy walk from Maxwell MRT.
Tanjong Pagar · $$$ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Hours unknown, check before you go
An independent record shop since 2011, upstairs in a shophouse: LPs, cassettes and the turntables, cartridges and speakers to play them on.
Look for number 18A. Shopping for a turntable? Since 2025 it also runs a second counter at The Adelphi near City Hall.
Tanjong Pagar · $$$ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Mon–Thu 10:00–20:00; Fri–Sat 10:00–21:30; Sun & public holidays 10:00–19:00
A tea shop since the late 1980s selling white, green, oolong and pu-erh teas and Yixing clay pots, with tea appreciation classes.
Book a tea appreciation session if you want the full story. Clay teapots are fragile: carry one on board, wrapped in a scarf.
Order: A pot of oolong, brewed at your table
Chinatown · $$ · MRT Maxwell (TE18)
Tea house Sun–Thu 11:00–21:00, Fri–Sat 11:00–22:30; shop opens 10:30
Sit down for a proper Chinese tea service in the tea house, then buy the leaves at the shop. Rare among tea shops: open into the evening.
Open till 21:00 or later, so it suits a calm after-dinner stop. Ask the staff to talk you through the teas before you buy.
River Valley · $$$ · MRT Fort Canning (DT20)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A design shop at New Bahru, a revamped school campus: tableware, lamps, vases, posters and textiles from small studios.
Posters roll into a tube for the flight. It delivers free in Singapore over S$100, handy if you are buying for a local friend.
River Valley · $$$ · MRT Fort Canning (DT20)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A plant shop with sculptural ceramic planters, bonsai and ferns, plus workshops where you shape a pot and plant it.
Live plants cannot fly home with you, so buy a planter or join a workshop instead. Stacked Store is in the next block.
River Valley · $$$ · MRT Fort Canning (DT20)
Hours unknown, check before you go
The home store of a local brand making organic cotton bedding, bath linen and soft furnishings. Feel-before-you-buy territory.
A pillowcase or bath towel packs flat if a duvet set will not fit. PPP Coffee is in the same block for a break between shops.
Bukit Merah · $$$ · MRT Redhill (EW18)
Hours unknown, check before you go
Blue-and-white porcelain drawn with HDB flats, kopi cups and Merlions, made with Japanese kilns. A Henderson Road design store.
Plates are wrapped well for flying; carry them on. Short of time? Its museum shops in town stock a smaller range.
Joo Chiat · $$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Wed–Mon 11:00–18:00; closed Tue
A small publisher's bookshop in The Modules: Singapore writing in Chinese and English, plus indie titles from Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Closed Tuesdays. Cherry Lane Records is in the same building, so pair the two and make an afternoon of Joo Chiat.
Joo Chiat · $$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A Joo Chiat shophouse that sells New York-style slices on the ground floor and racks of vinyl sorted by genre on the floor above.
Eat first, dig after. Cat Socrates and RetroCrates are a few doors away, so this is the anchor for an east-side shop crawl.
Joo Chiat · $$$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A record shop inside The Modules on Joo Chiat Road, with crates of LPs to flip through between a bookshop visit and lunch.
City Book Room is upstairs in the same building. Records go in hand luggage, sandwiched between clothes, never in the hold.
Joo Chiat · $$$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A small shophouse record shop at the quiet end of Joo Chiat Road, worth a flip-through on the way between pizza and Peranakan houses.
Guides list it as closed on Mondays. Choice Cuts is two doors down, so check both crates before deciding what to carry home.
Joo Chiat · $$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A vintage clothing shop on the northern stretch of Joo Chiat Road, a calmer browse than the Haji Lane racks.
Guides list it as open daily. Walk south afterwards to the Koon Seng Road shophouses and the record shops in the 440s.
Joo Chiat · $$$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Mon–Sat 10:00–18:00; Sun 10:00–17:00
A boutique collective of small, mostly women-led brands: homewares, clothing, art and gifts, chosen for being made thoughtfully.
The easiest one-stop gift shop in the east. Cat Socrates and Choice Cuts are a block away; there is a second shop at Tanglin Mall.
Joo Chiat · $$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
Cards, prints, pins and notebooks by Singapore illustrators in a Joo Chiat shophouse, guarded by a resident cat.
The postcards and enamel pins are the lightest good gift in the east. Choice Cuts and A Raft of Otters are a short walk away.
Katong · $$ · MRT Marine Parade (TE26)
Hours unknown, check before you go
Past the dumpling counter is a Peranakan shop of beaded slippers, embroidered kebaya and nyonya porcelain in a Katong shophouse.
Skip the food queue and head inside for the beadwork and kebaya. Beaded slippers are made by hand, and the prices reflect it.
Tagore · $$$ · MRT Lentor (TE5)
Hours unknown, check before you go
A workshop keeping rattan weaving alive in an industrial estate up north, making furniture and smaller pieces by hand.
A real trek, and recent coverage lists short weekday hours only, so call first. Ask about posting anything big.
Unofficial · not affiliated with TOKEN2049. Hours and prices change; check before you go.