Jewel Changi Airport is either the world's best airport terminal or the world's strangest shopping mall — a glass-domed complex connecting Changi Airport's three terminals that houses the world's tallest indoor waterfall, a five-storey indoor forest, and 280 shops and restaurants in a space designed by Moshe Safdie (who also designed Marina Bay Sands) to make layovers feel like a destination.
The Rain Vortex — a 40-metre indoor waterfall that plunges through the centre of the dome from a circular opening in the roof — is the building's centrepiece, and at night it becomes a light show that projects patterns and colours onto the falling water. The Shiseido Forest Valley, a terraced indoor garden climbing five storeys around the waterfall, contains over 2,000 trees and palms and provides a walking trail through tropical vegetation that is surreal enough inside an airport to make you question whether you've actually landed.
The top floor, Canopy Park, has a hedge maze, mirror maze, walking nets suspended above the forest, and a topiary walk — all at the top of an airport terminal, which is the kind of civic ambition that other countries direct toward museums or parks but Singapore directs toward making sure travellers have a good time. Jewel is accessible from the MRT without an airline ticket, and many Singaporeans visit it as a weekend destination rather than a transit hub. The food court includes hawker stalls from some of Singapore's most famous vendors, making it possible to eat world-class S$5 chicken rice while watching a 40-metre waterfall — a combination that exists nowhere else on Earth.
Verified Facts
The Rain Vortex is 40 metres tall, the world's tallest indoor waterfall
Jewel was designed by Moshe Safdie and opened in 2019
The complex contains over 280 shops and restaurants
The Shiseido Forest Valley contains over 2,000 trees and palms
Get walking directions
78 Airport Boulevard, Singapore 819666
