SHIPPED! Vessels of Taste opens at ArCH Square on Saturday 31 October 2026 and stays up through Wednesday 31 March 2027. Admission is free. Hours are Wednesday to Sunday, 10am to 6pm, closed on public holidays. The centre sits at 125 Jalan Sultan in 甘榜格南, a 10 to 12 minute walk from 武吉士 MRT. HeritageSG co-created the exhibition with Museum of Food, the independent non-profit founded by cookbook authors Emily and Yeo Min.
The hang looks at ceramics, bottles and storage jars as everyday kitchen tools rather than cargo. HeritageSG's page puts culinary traditions, foodways and memory across generations in the same room as the archaeology. Singapore Art & Gallery Guide lists it as an extension of SHIPPED!: Memories from the Sea, the earlier underwater archaeology show in this building. That first hang, tied to Singapore HeritageFest in May, put Empress of Asia wreck material and Jingdezhen ceramics on Level 1. Vessels of Taste keeps the maritime thread and follows the objects onto the table.
Museum of Food runs heritage cooking classes, a vintage kitchenware collection and a Singapore cookbook library. The tins in the opening photographs are the kind of object the show wants you to notice: an Ayam Brand tin reused as a rice scoop, a Horlicks tin, a Nespray tin, a Hacks tin, a peanut-butter cup used as a measure. Those labels sat in Singapore cupboards for decades. The exhibition treats them as evidence, the same way a shard from a Kampong Gelam dig is evidence.
Opening weekend, 31 October and 1 November
Archaeology X ICH programmes run both opening days from 10.30am to 5pm. Buy tickets at archxich.peatix.com. The same three sessions repeat on Saturday and Sunday. Book the day you can actually walk to Jalan Sultan. Phone ArCH Square at +65 9824 1277 or email archsquare@heritage.sg if a slot looks full. The official programmes page went up on 21 October.
The Time Capsule workshop
Workshop 1, The Time Capsule, runs 10.30am to 12pm. Tickets are S$25 excluding GST. Museum of Food pairs with By My Old School, the family vintage shop Rebecca and her father Winston started in 2010. The session starts from a biscuit tin that holds matchsticks, family photos or cash instead of biscuits. Rebecca talks through boxes she has collected and how people filled them. You leave with an upcycled container, put a few items in it, and write a note to whoever might open it later.
Stories in the Shards with Hafiz Rashid
The tour sits at 2pm to 3pm. Tickets are S$15 excluding GST. Title on the official page: Stories in the Shards: A Folktale Tour of ArCH Square. Hafiz Rashid has volunteered with the National Heritage Board since 2013. He works as a museum docent and storyteller, often in textiles, and has appeared at Storyfest at the Arts House and Singapore Heritagefest. He answers Kampong Gelam finds and shipwreck cargo with folktales from the Nusantara. The copy asks what a broken ceramic shard might still tell. Colour, motif and function start the story. The caption does not finish it.
Fermenting plants for colour
Workshop 2, Fermenting Plants for Colours with Wild Dot, runs 3.30pm to 5pm. Tickets are S$25 excluding GST. Wild Dot is the Singapore studio Shirin Rafie and Liz Liu Yihui founded in 2020. They make pigments and inks from plants that grow here. A paintmaker from the studio walks through fermentation as a way to pull colour from plants, then lets you try it. The session sits after the tour. A full-day visitor can do the tin workshop, the shard stories and the dye table without leaving Jalan Sultan.
After opening weekend the gallery keeps Wednesday to Sunday, 10am to 6pm, through 31 March 2027. Closed Mondays, Tuesdays and public holidays. The visit page says parking is not available on site. Use nearby public carparks in the Jalan Sultan and Kampong Gelam precinct, or walk. From Bugis MRT head toward Sultan Gate and Jalan Sultan. About 10 to 12 minutes. Lavender MRT is about 10 minutes. Buses along Jalan Sultan drop you a 3 to 5 minute walk away. Routes are mostly flat.
The same stretch of 甘榜格南 holds the Teroka Nusantara Festival at Malay Heritage Centre from 6 to 8 November. ArCH Square is the archaeology and food-heritage stop. The palace compound at 85 Sultan Gate is the music and house-types stop. Both sit north of 武吉士 station. The malls around the interchange are a separate walk after you leave.
Practical Details
- Dates: Saturday 31 October 2026 to Wednesday 31 March 2027. Opening programmes Saturday 31 October and Sunday 1 November, 10.30am to 5pm
- Time: Wednesday to Sunday, 10am to 6pm. Closed public holidays
- Venue: ArCH Square, 125 Jalan Sultan, Singapore 199011
- Nearest MRT: Bugis, East-West and Downtown lines. Also Lavender
- Price: Exhibition free. Workshops S$25 excluding GST. Folktale tour S$15 excluding GST
- Website: SHIPPED! Vessels of Taste
