Christmas Wonderland at Gardens by the Bay

Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay has followed the welcoming of its 20 millionth visitor by launching an extravaganza of lights, a yuletide floral display with an 11-metre Christmas Pyramid and massive toy fair.

To mark the milestone, management of the attraction invited the 20 millionth visitor, Gowri Subramanian, to launch the Christmas Toyland floral display alongside Singapore Minister for National Development Lawrence Wong.

The Christmas Wonderland transformation features a traditional German wooden carousel decked with toys that is act as a stage for live performances on selected weekends.

More than 40 varieties of flowers are featured in the floral display, including poinsettia, Christmas rose, winter heather and holly among coniferous trees imported from New Zealand.

Other varieties were grown in glasshouses on site.

Designers replicated a North Pole-like setting with toy soldiers, reindeer and nutcrackers. The Flower Dome’s usual temperature is 23 degrees Celsius, but this will be lowered by two degrees for the Christmas Toyland display. It gets even colder at night to preserve the temperate flora. After the Dome is closed to visitors, temperatures will be brought down to 14 degrees Celsius.

The Gardens also launched its new Auto Riders - driverless shuttles aimed at making it easier for visitors to move around the sprawling grounds.

While the vehicles can travel up to 40 kilometres per hour, they have been set to 8 kilometres per hour, equivalent to brisk walking speed. Multiple brakes have also been installed.

Introducing the Auto Riders, Gardens Chief Operating Officer Felix Loh explained “even though it is driverless, for a start we will have somebody on board acting as a tour guide and he can also be a safety officer.

"There are three emergency buttons. At any point when they think a situation may happen they can press the emergency button and the vehicle will come to a complete stop."

In 2014, Gardens by the Bay welcomed 6.4 million visitors and management expects a record 8 million visitors this year. 

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