Bar entertainment in Singapore City
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Beaujolais Wine Bar
A très cute shophouse bar with chequered Montmarte tablecloths, bentwood chairs, slate floors and low-key jazz. It’s a welcome relief from the raft of très chic industrial-looking bars now dotting the city.
reviewed
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Harry’s Bar
Harry’s has spawned an empire of bars across the island but the original is still the best. This financial-district hang-out gained infamy as the haunt of Barings-buster Nick Leeson. Grab a pint and toast his misdeeds.
reviewed
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Alley Bar
Sky-high ceilings, dark timbers, candlelight and slick stylings paint this alleyway bar with restrained melodrama. Yuppies and expats converse in shadowy, cushioned nooks, quaffing wine and on-tap Belgian beers.
reviewed
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Wine Network
Tucked away in the Dempsey Rd furniture and antiques ghetto, this is a real find. A small, intimate bar with rough wooden floors and crumbling brick walls lined with wine bottles, where the wine is as cheap or expensive as you like (bottles start at $18, or it’s $7 a glass). Sit inside, or enjoy the sight of the semiderelict colonial barracks and the sound of twittering birds on the deck. Pizzas, German sausages and cheese platters fight off hunger. Get off the bus at stop B03 on Holland Rd; from here it’s a 10-minute walk.
reviewed
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St James Power Station
The latest and greatest posterboy of Singapore's night scene, St James Power Sta-tion is a 1920s coal-fired power station ingeniously converted into an entertainment complex. All the bars and clubs are interconnected, so one cover charge (men/women S$12/10, Wednesday men S$30) gets access to all of them. Some bars - Gallery Bar, Lobby Bar and Peppermint Park - have no cover charge at all. Minimum age is 18 for women and 23 for men at all except Pow-erhouse, where the age is 18 for both.
reviewed
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Cafe Domus
This fantastic chill-out space is located on a seldom-traversed (by tourists) street just around the corner from Little India’s ‘curry belt’. Bare wooden ceilings, peony-painted walls and an opulent Tiffany chandelier are just some of the quirkier decorations of this café-bar frequented by artists, architects and other young professionals in creative industries. The backyard bamboo garden (complete with a narrow platform perch, accessible by spiral staircase) is a particularly intimate touch.
reviewed
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Eski
The name is derived from the word ‘Eskimo’, and with good reason; Eski is Singapore’s first sub-zero bar, complete with a solid ice bar for downing frozen shots of – what else – vodka. Singapore visitors foolish enough to have forgotten to pack ski parkas needn’t worry, though; loaner winter clothing is available, and a good thing too, as temperatures here plummet to a testicle-shrinking -10°C.
reviewed
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Dempsey’s Hut
This jovial open-air bar is deep in the thickly forested former British army barracks around Dempsey Rd. Like its nearby wine-bar rivals, it’s worth a visit as one of the few places near the city where you can enjoy a spot of unbridled nature – at a reasonable price too. The tables are laid out under the trees (bring repellent) and the beer costs a meagre $5 per mug, or $20 a jug. There’s also a decent menu.
reviewed
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The Rooftop
This diminutive and lovely rooftop bar in the pink triangle district offers a secluded respite from the thumping music and crowds of the surrounding area. The bar itself, which barely seats six, serves fine, reasonably priced wine, beer and cocktails. And the outdoor patio, with just enough room for an additional dozen, offers panoramic views of Singapore’s night sky.
reviewed
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Prince of Wales
A rough at the edges, knockabout Australian pub, which doubles as a backpacker hostel. With friendly, laconic bar staff, live music on most nights and a small beer garden, it’s one of the few bars in Little India – and a little surreal on Sunday nights, when the streets are packed with migrant workers from the subcontinent enjoying their off-day.
reviewed
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California Jam
A little rock 'n' roll bar in Changi Village. Jimi Hendrix posters, beer on tap and the occasional transvestite sex worker gives this place a 'Walk on the Wild Side' vibe. California Jam is part of the strip of bars on Changi Village Rd that's somewhat popular with locals and expats looking to escape the trendy crush of central Singapore.
reviewed
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Cows & Coolies Karaoke Pub
Smoke-filled (despite a city-wide ban on smoking) and often loud, C&C is a throwback to the good old days when a neighbourhood bar was a place you came to drown your sorrows in loud music, cigarettes and booze. Though it doesn’t bill itself as a gay bar per se, the bar is very popular with both the gay and lesbian crowd.
reviewed
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Sunset Bay Garden Beach Bar
What could be finer than relaxing with cocktails in a car-free beachside park in the early evening? Sunset Bay offers just that, and with an excellent menu you can show up for dinner and while the night away to the far-off thrumming of hundreds of cargo ships moored just off Singapore’s southern shore. A rare find, indeed!
reviewed
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Loof
This rooftop bar gets its name from the Singlish (local slang) mangling of the word ‘roof’. Ambient beats soothe away the city noise and comfy leather-clad seats are scattered around the deck…perhaps these are to blame for the mellow crowd. For privacy (and air-con), ask for one of the seven semi-enclosed seating areas.
reviewed
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Bisous Bar
Bisous seems to have cut a deal with Heineken; familiar green awnings and frangipani trees sheltering drinkers from whatever they're trying to forget. Big-screen TVs draw business types and sports fans, sipping lychee martinis and savouring snacks from a decent Mexican/Mediterranean menu.
reviewed
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Brewerkz
Across the river from Clarke Quay, this large microbrewery (the irony doesn’t escape us) brews eight beers on site, including an Indian Pale Ale, Pilsener and Golden Ale. Happy hours run from opening to 9pm, with prices escalating throughout the day (pints S$4 to S$15, jugs S$10 to S$37).
reviewed
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Vincent’s
Singapore’s first gay bar spent years in Lucky Plaza on Orchard Rd before moving to bigger, better premises to take advantage of what was at the time the developing gay ghetto around Tanjong Pagar. It’s a popular starting-out point and offers a free gay guide to Singapore.
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Bar Opiume
Very posey, Bar Opiume is facing Boat Quay. The expensive, slightly mismatched decor features a huge chandelier and large standing Buddhas. Not surprisingly for a location like this, the drink prices might have you sipping slowly, but the quiet spot next to the river is priceless.
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Kazbar
Popular Middle Eastern-themed pub, with curtained nooks and deep sofas inside and bar tables outside. Male office workers seem strangely drawn to the place: surely nothing to do with the comely belly dancer doing the rounds in the early evening - must be the dips and pita bread.
reviewed
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No 5
Not much imagination went into naming this long-running boozer in a 1910 Peranakan shophouse. Expect retro-Asiatic touches, vats of chilli vodka and smoky snooker vibes. It’s damned touristy around here, but the cool evening ambience is sweet relief from Orchard Rd.
reviewed
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Le Carillon de L’angelus
The excellent wines do justice to the superb tiled interior of this French wine bar. Lovely though it is upstairs, our favourite spot is the comfy chairs and sofa downstairs in a private little nook facing the chalkboard wine list. The cheese platter is a must.
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Bedroom Bar
Yes, you read it right: this narrow Canadian-owned hole-in-the-wall stays open until 07:00 - a magnet for hardcore drinkers. Gloomily decorated with Chinese lanterns and a pink-lit fish tank, it has a certain dingy charm. Happy hours run from 17:00 to 21:00.
reviewed
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BQ Bar
This quayside box fills with phone-wielding businessmen having one-way conversations about selling photocopiers. The amazing concrete bar and lilting jazz give it the edge over its Boat Quay brethren. Marathon happy hours run from 11:30 to 20:00 daily.
reviewed
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The Terrace
Part of the hip Screening Room, the views across Chinatown and the CBD from this intimate rooftop bar are superb. Bag a comfy couch on the periphery, kick the shoes off and have a shouting-into-each-other's-ears conversation over the sound system.
reviewed
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Next Page
This is where Hunter S Thompson would have hung out if he’d been a journo in Singapore. Dark timber bar, red lanterns, exposed brickwork, booths, pool table, Carlsberg on tap and quirky bartenders – sit down and write the next page of your novel.
reviewed
