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Between restaurant visits and churning out reviews for Time Out’s Food & Drink column, I like to embark on the occasional side quest, especially when it involves forgotten places in Singapore. Last year, that meant checking out a vacant infectious disease hospital along Moulmein Road, a once shunned and heavily stigmatised institution. This time, I’m starting 2026 strong with a very different kind of adventure: wandering through a defunct oil blending plant from the 1960s, alongside other fascinating spots buried deep inside Woodlands.
I first spotted these mysterious green tanks on social media. Looming behind an old HDB estate and just across the Causeway to Johor Bahru, they looked peculiar and almost out of place. Turns out, these belong to the former Shell Woodlands North Lubricant Oil Blending Plant, a restricted site that played a key role in Singapore’s industrialisation. These days, the only way in is with Hidden Heritage’s Industrial Relics and Wartime Secrets tour ($98 per person), which is also redeemable with SG Culture Pass credits.
The feeling hits almost immediately when I step into the compound. There’s something slightly eerie about entering a place previously bustling with hundreds of workers a day, now completely silent on a Sunday morning at 9am. Imagine being an HDB resident here years ago, peering out the window at this massive industrial complex of pipes, tanks and steel, humming day and night.
Hidden Heritage founders Amanda and Stanley lead the group with great enthusiasm and deep research, as they did on our tour of the former CDC last year. This site, however, is especially special to them, given that they tied the knot here years ago in a gothic-themed wedding that was as unconventional as it could get.
I learn that the Woodlands plant opened in 1963, during Singapore’s big push towards industrialisation. Jurong was the initial stronghold, but as development increased in the 60s, Woodlands quickly became a second major hub. The Shell plant was officially opened by Finance Minister Goh Keng Swee at the time.
So what exactly happened here? Crude oil from the neighbouring Pulau Bukom would be transported to Woodlands, where additives were blended in to produce different grades of lubricants for everything from industrial machinery to power stations. Operations moved to Tuas in 2018 when there was a greater need for automation and advanced technology. And so everything that’s left here is pretty much a relic of the past, untouched since the site was vacated eight years ago.
Walking through the facility today feels like stepping into a movie set, or at the very least, an industrial-themed Universal Studios ride modelled after a movie set. Elevated flooring connects old control rooms to blending sections, with a complex network of pipes criss-crossing overhead. The oil drum filling station is one highlight of the tour: rows of metal rollers still spin underfoot, and it’s strangely fun to walk across them, picturing drums of up to 200 litres being shunted along.
Nature, inevitably, is reclaiming the space. Owl droppings dot the floor. Birds’ nests cling to beams. Palm civets have also made themselves at home. One of the coolest parts of the tour includes scaling flights of see-through metal stairs (something to take note of if you have a fear of heights) to reach the top floor of the building. This area houses plenty of tanks – and bats – and was hence dubbed the ‘Gotham City’ of Woodlands by tour participants.
The ‘brain’ of the compound is the control room, where a big window overlooks the outdoor tank farm. Let’s just say, it’s hard to resist the urge to press and turn every button and knob, even though they no longer work. But I’m more excited to hear that I’ll have 20 minutes to explore the system of green tanks outside at my own pace. Beyond the unique photo ops, getting to stand and walk among these towering structures, and feeling how tiny you are in comparison, is as rare and unusual an experience as you can get in Singapore.
At this point, we’re about halfway through the excursion, but there’s still more to see. After a quick coffee and toilet break, we’re introduced to a series of old religious artefacts just down the road. Scattered casually along the pavement, these shrines are easy to miss if you don’t know what you’re looking for. They sit unbothered by traffic and modern development, still visited by a handful of worshippers today.
From there, we hop onto a bus – a cushy upgrade from the public buses used in earlier iterations of the tour. The ride takes us to the grounds of what was once a mental asylum, later repurposed as a workers’ dormitory. Unfortunately, we aren’t actually allowed in.
What’s more interesting, however, is the entrance to the site of Hawkins Road Refugee Camp just beside it, now overgrown and shrouded in greenery. Known as Singapore’s first and only refugee camp to date, it used to house Vietnamese refugees during the 1970s, and was born out of the controversial Operation Thunderstorm project during that time.
A short five-minute trek into the forest takes us to an unsuspecting concrete structure. Unbeknownst to most, it’s actually an air raid shelter built during the Japanese occupation, which took on a more unexpected role – a playground for children growing up in the area. We end the tour at View Road, with the sun beating down past noon.
Stanley and Amanda’s tours offer more than just exclusive access to restricted areas, but real, forgotten histories that you won’t get to hear elsewhere. That said, the magic of this particular tour lies in the first half at the former Shell plant, which we hear is slated to be demolished in the next few years (along with the residential blocks around the area) for the expansion of the Causeway. Once that happens, this Gotham City-like tank farm and all its rickety structures will disappear for good. So, if you’ve got SG Culture Pass credits to spare and a soft spot for the forgotten corners of Singapore, this is a side quest worth embarking on.
Find out more about Hidden Heritage’s Industrial Relics and Wartime Secrets tour and get your tickets here.
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