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The Depository documents 14 techniques in Singapore; by risk level: 11 critically endangered, 3 endangered. Each record opens with a public summary; the full research record is free to view once registered.
Ketupat weaving is the traditional Malay craft of folding and interlacing fresh young coconut or palm leaves into a diamond-shaped pouch for cooking rice — the raw rice placed inside the woven pouch and boiled until the rice expands to…
Singapore's rattan furniture tradition is one of the last surviving furniture-making craft practices in the city-state — a tradition of constructing chairs, tables, and storage items from rattan cane using techniques brought from Guangdong…
The Singapore straw fire dragon is a ritual object built once every three years for Mun San Fook Tuck Chee Temple in Geylang, the only temple in Singapore to perform this dragon dance, held on the second day of the second lunar month to…
Chinese seal carving (zhuan ke) is the ancient practice of carving Chinese characters in reverse intaglio into stone, ivory, jade, or wood to create personal name seals (chops) used for official signatures in Chinese cultural practice.
Kim Sin (金身, literally "golden body" in Hokkien) is the Singapore Chinese craft of hand-carving and restoring wooden statues of Taoist deities for temple worship — a permanent devotional object, carved and painted piece by piece, distinct…
The making of the songkok — the brimless, truncated-cone felt or fabric cap worn by Malay/Muslim men across Southeast Asia — as practiced by a now critically small number of remaining specialist craftsmen in Singapore, officially…
Teochew Chinese opera (chao ju) is Singapore's most practiced Chinese opera dialect — performed in Singapore's Teochew community temples and community stages for deity birthdays, festivals, and ritual occasions.
Chinese paper effigy making (zhi zha) is the craft of constructing three-dimensional paper objects — houses, cars, electronic devices, clothing, food, luxury goods — to be burned as offerings for the deceased in Chinese Taoist and Buddhist…
The Foochow Chinese lantern tradition of Singapore — specifically the hand-made split bamboo and rice paper lanterns produced for the Mid-Autumn Festival and Chinese New Year — is one of the most visually iconic and most endangered craft…
Little India's goldsmithing tradition is one of Singapore's most commercially active surviving craft practices — a cluster of Indian goldsmith workshops along Serangoon Road and the surrounding streets producing traditional South Indian…
Kolam is the traditional South Indian Tamil practice of drawing geometric and floral patterns on floors and thresholds using rice flour — practiced daily in Hindu Tamil households as a spiritual protective act and on festival occasions as…
Capal is the traditional Malay leather sandal worn as part of formal Malay dress — the baju melayu outfit worn at Hari Raya, weddings, and official Malay cultural occasions.
Singapore's Peranakan beadwork and kebaya making tradition is the last surviving urban instance of a craft that was once practiced across the Straits Settlements.
The making and wood-firing of pottery in a dragon kiln — a long, sloped, tunnel-form brick kiln built directly into a hillside — at Thow Kwang Pottery Jungle in western Singapore, the nation's only remaining operational dragon kiln and one…