Don’t Miss the Most Beautiful Shophouses Along Koon Seng Road in Singapore

Last Updated on April 18, 2024 by Adam Watts

The most beautiful street in Singapore is Koon Seng Road.

Beauty is subjective of course. One person’s Mona Lisa is another person’s steaming pile of hot garbage. One person’s steaming pile of hot garbage is another person’s Mona Lisa.

But let’s be real here. The Peranakan shophouse above is beautiful. It’s colourful, it’s ornate, it has that distressed look that my better half finds powerfully compelling on furniture.

If you look at the above picture and find it hideously ugly, well, my friend, you better close this page quick fast because it’s about to get a whole lot worse for you.

More colours! Even the trash cans on the street fit into the whole aesthetic.

Shophouses like this can be found all over the island, but rarely this vibrant and ornate, which is what makes this section of Koon Seng Road the most beautiful street in Singapore.

Shophouses are an important part of Singapore’s cultural heritage. Generally two to three storeys high, built in contiguous blocks, they are narrow, small terraced houses, and the most common architectural style across the entire period from the 1840s to the 1960s.

Since the 1960s, new buildings are in more modern architectural styles and in very recent years some of the most unique buildings architecturally anywhere in the world can be found in Singapore.

These photos are all from one small section of Koon Seng Road, but adjacent Joo Chiat Road is a great place to find shophouses too, albeit mostly less colourful. The whole area is definitely worth a visit!

For more beautiful things, check out incredible photos of some of the most beautiful places across the planet, from the Taj Mahal to Neuschwanstein Castle.