Photo by Jansen Jang unsplash.com
The Jewel Changi airport connects our urban surroundings with the beauty of nature. It contains the largest indoor gardens in Asia which features a Shiseido forest valley containing 3,000 trees, 60,000 shrubs and 120 tropical plants, The rain vortex which is the worlds largest indoor urban waterfall at 40 meters in height created from rain water, a topiary walk & petal garden and many more features.
It was designed by the Safdie architects which covers an area of 3,5 hectares with a dome shaped facade made of steel and glass in order to bring together a market place and a urban park in one building.
Moshe Safdie also designed the Marina bay sands, the Asian university for women, and the national gallery of Canada, Moshe is an Israeli Canadian architect and urban designer who studied at Mcgill university in Montreal, Canada and later became a director at the Harvard university graduate school of design 1984 to 1989. Peter Walker and Partners were the landscape architects for the Changi airport, who worked along side Moshe Safdie and also with the creation of the Marina bay sands.
The breathtaking Shiseido forest valley contains four levels of 3,000 indoor trees, so people can do their shopping or eat food surrounded by a magnificent urban forest, it covers an area of 22,000 sq ms and also has two foot paths to the East and the West to admire & explore until you come to the impressive waterfall and mist. There is also a multi sensorial project known as “sense” which is to reconnect your mind to the senses such as with touch, smell, sound and sight and part of the project is combined with the forest valley in which each level is associated with a different sense, during the night colourful glowing lights of bright purples, blues and greens are lit up among the trees with the sound of the forest breathing and other music, this is to create a calming and revitalizing experience for visitors.
The amazing waterfall of the Rain vortex is the tallest and also the largest in the world in which rainwater is recycled from the stunning toroid shaped glass dome roof and then flows through a circular opening to a pool below at the basement, which looks fantastic as one enters the airport. There is also an automated driverless sky train close to the waterfall with wonderful views which travels to seven different stations including border gates for easy access for passengers.
The canopy park contains a topiary walk and a petal garden followed by mazes, bouncing nets and mist for enjoyment and entertainment within the top level of the airport which covers an area of 14.000 sq m. The topiary has trees which have been clipped into realistic animal shapes such as apes and chameleons in bright colours around the garden.
Also in the canopy park is the petal garden with beautiful all year round flowers in many shapes and colours from different regions of the world. There is also a canopy bridge in this area which is 23 metres high with glass floor panels in the centre for lovely views of the waterfall and mist at the start and the end of the bridge.
The rest of the park has a hedge maze in which the hedges reach up to 1.8 metres high, a mirror maze with surrounding and overhead mirrors, a bouncing net and a walking net for activities for children and more.
Pelargonium Species world 