PARKROYAL on Pickering

It is a working hotel rather than a paid attraction, so most people come to look at the exterior: over 15,000 square metres of greenery, waterfalls and curved sky-garden shelves stacked up the building, facing the open lawn of Hong Lim Park across the street. There is nothing to book and nothing to pay to see it from outside, and it takes only a few minutes. The upper sky-gardens, infinity pool and cabanas are for hotel guests, though the ground-floor Lime restaurant and bar are open to non-residents.

It sits two minutes' walk from Hong Lim Market and Food Centre, one of Chinatown's oldest hawker centres. Come out of Chinatown MRT Exit E towards Chinatown Point; the hotel is a two-minute walk and Hong Lim Park, the best vantage point, is directly across Upper Pickering Street.

Photograph the building from inside Hong Lim Park across the road, not from the pavement directly beneath it — from the lawn you can see the full stack of curved planter shelves and the way the greenery layers up the tower, whereas standing at street level under the overhang shows you only the underside. If you want to be among the greenery rather than just look at it, a drink at the ground-floor Lime bar is the only part open without a room booking.