A morning in Tiong Bahru

Tiong Bahru is one of the oldest public housing estates in Singapore, and one of the few neighbourhoods where the ground floor still does most of the work. Nearly everything happens within a four-minute walk.

The market opens before six. By half past seven there is a queue at the coffee stall and the tables upstairs are full. The bakery on the corner opens at eight, and the bookshop somewhat later, on its own schedule.

What makes the estate work is its scale. The blocks are low, the streets are narrow, the shade is continuous, and the shophouse arcades mean you can cross most of the neighbourhood without an umbrella.

Morrow House sits on the quieter edge of this, one street back from the busiest corner. That was the point: close enough to walk to everything, far enough that the street outside your window is not the one everybody parks on.