Thow Kwang Pottery Jungle

Thow Kwang Pottery Jungle sits down a track off Lorong Tawas, out past Nanyang Avenue in Singapore’s far west, built around a dragon kiln raised in 1940 by migrants from Chaozhou. The Tan family has run the place since 1965.

The kiln is a 27-metre brick tunnel climbing a slope, stoke holes down both flanks, and it is the only one in Singapore that still gets lit. The tour takes you inside it. Around it the ground opens out into a showroom that spills outdoors: tableware, garden pots, stools, lamps and old furniture stacked along the paths, a pond in the middle. Workshops run to a booked schedule, and you choose your depth. Two hours learning to centre clay on the wheel, three hours pairing hand building with a turn at it, longer throwing courses, or a private session for a group.

Book ahead, because there are no walk-in workshops and an instructor is only on site when a class is scheduled; the grounds and the showroom need nothing arranged. Parking is free but there are barely a handful of lots, so come early, and follow the operator’s own directions rather than your phone, which sends people to the wrong gate. Otherwise take bus 199 from Boon Lay interchange. Almost all of the site is open ground with no air-conditioning, and it gets hot by midday. And ask when the kiln is next due to be lit: it happens two or three times a year and burns unbroken for a day and a half.