The best places to ice skate and catch some snow in Singapore

For Christmas this year, Capitol Singapore and CHIJMES have organised a slew of events for you to have some family festive fun. For starters, try out their slate of whimsical activities – get in some snowy fun by booking an admission to the Snow Play area, where you'll get to touch, play and make snow angels in simulated snow at Basement 1 of Capitol Singapore. If you've got some skating chops, you can buy tickets to enjoy 30 minutes of fun on the skating rink at CHIJMES for just $5. Otherwise, they've got hands-on craft workshops, live carolling, heritage tour rides and a Christmas market to light up your Christmas. 

While natural snow is unlikely to fall in tropical Singapore, the city makes up for the lack of sub-zero temperatures with faux snow. Spanning at 3,000 square-metres, the three-storey-high winter wonderland has a 60-metre-long snow slope, an ice gallery, a bumper car arena, and photo-taking memories to capture those magical moments.

New this year is Singapore's very first Ice Hotel Gallery. This new permanent exhibition features impressive sculptures and furniture entirely carved out of ice. Don your warmest winter wear and step into chilly temperatures of -5 degrees Celsius.  Lounge at the Ice Bar, which has been furnished with chairs, couches and tables fashioned out of blocks of ice and admire local icons and scenes of flora and fauna, depicted in intricate ice sculptures carved by local award-winning artisan Jeffrey Ng. 

Cool off from the sweltering heat by skating around Singapore's first and only Olympic-sized ice skating rink. Besides opening the floor for the public to show their best figure-8s, The Rink also hosts international tournaments in ice hockey, figure skating, and ice curling, as well as cool (see what we did there?) events like disco skating which takes place on alternate Saturdays. New to the gig? Skating aids are also available to save you from slipping around like Bambi.

Nothing but ice, ice, baby. While it's slightly smaller than The Rink, Kallang Ice World boasts a superior ice surface and gallery-style spectator seating, designed to match competition standards. Dedicate to converting you from side clingers to semi-pro skaters, it conducts an extensive range of courses that cater to both the rookies and pros. It also makes an ideal venue for ice-skating performances, competitions, and even birthday parties. That's right, the ice rink is also available to rent for private events.