A Short History of Kampong Glam, Street by Street

Our smaller counter, Li'l Habibi, sits at 55 Haji Lane, and guests often ask how old all this is. The honest answer: older than the shophouses, younger than most people guess, and several of the dates you will read online do not agree with each other.

This is the short version, written from the National Library Board’s Infopedia articles on Kampong Glam, Sultan Mosque and Istana Kampong Glam, all read on 28 September 2026. Where they disagree, we say so. The practical version — where to eat, when the mosque lets visitors in — is in our guide to eating around Sultan Mosque and the Haji Lane food guide.

The name comes from a tree

Gelam is the Malay name for the cajeput tree. According to the library, the orang laut — sea nomads of the Glam tribe — lived in a village by the shore here when the British arrived, and they used the tree for almost everything: the bark for awnings and sails, the timber for boats and firewood, the fruit ground as a pepper, and the leaves boiled into cajeput oil for rheumatism and cramps. The same article records an earlier name for the area, Seduyong, and says the place was first written down as “Campong Gelam” around 1830.

1819 to 1824: a sultan, a treaty and a plot of land

In 1819 Hussein Shah signed an agreement with Stamford Raffles of the East India Company that let the British set up a trading post on the island. In Raffles’s 1822 town plan, Kampong Glam was allotted to the Malays, the Bugis and the Arabs. On 14 March 1823 the land east of the European town, between the Rochor River and the sea, was given to Sultan Hussein, and on 2 August 1824 he ceded Singapore to the Company.

Two figures for the size of that land do not match, and both come from the same library: 56 acres in the Kampong Glam article, an estimated 200 acres for the 1823 grant in the Istana article. The Istana article also notes that John Crawfurd, the second Resident, later ran roads through the property and fragmented it, so the safe reading is that the grant started large and was cut down.

The sultan brought some 600 family members from Riau. Around them settled Bugis, Arab, Javanese and Boyanese communities, each in its own “mini-kampong” — Kampong Bugis, Kampong Java, Kampong Malacca — and by 1824 at least a third of the residents were Chinese. It was a patchwork from the start.

The site was not uncontested, either. The library records a rift between Raffles and William Farquhar, who thought this stretch of coast would be better used as the island’s business centre. Raffles won, and in 1831 the area was developed by 200 convict labourers in eight months, at a total cost of $500.

The first mosque, and a date that depends on who you ask

Hussein asked for a mosque near his palace, and Raffles contributed $3,000 towards it. The library’s Sultan Mosque article says both that it was “first built in 1824” and that the original single-storey building was completed in 1826; the mosque’s own website dates its history to 1824. Our reading: begun 1824, finished 1826.

The palace that was built later than everyone thought

Sultan Hussein left for Malacca under mounting debts and died there on 5 September 1835. When his eldest son, Tengku Ali, came to claim the estate in 1840, the colonial government gave him a monthly pension and let the family keep living at Kampong Glam.

For a long time the yellow istana on Sultan Gate was said to have been built by Tengku Ali in 1840. According to the library, research commissioned by the Malay Heritage Centre found that it was in fact completed in 1890, by the colonial government, for Tengku Ali’s son, Tungku Allum. The yellow is the colour of Malay royalty.

The family's hold on the land did not last. After a court dispute in the 1890s and the Sultan Hussain Ordinance of 1904, the estate became state land on 1 January 1905; the descendants were allowed to stay, but the land was no longer theirs.

1910: the streets get their Muslim-world names

Bussorah Street, Muscat Street and Kandahar Street — named after Basra, Muscat and Kandahar, places in the Muslim world — had their names approved by the municipal commissioners at a meeting on 15 April 1910. The district is old; the street signs are Edwardian.

Haji Lane, where our counter is, is usually explained by the pilgrim trade: the lane was home to businesses that arranged the haj for Muslims travelling through Singapore. It is the standard story and we think it is the right one, but we have not found it in the library’s own articles, so treat it as the common account rather than a documented fact.

1924 to 1932: the mosque you see now

By 1924 the old mosque needed repairs, and its trustees proposed a new, larger one at an estimated $200,000. It was designed by Denis Santry of Swan & Maclaren and built in phases, partly because fundraising ran alongside construction and partly so that prayers were never stopped. North Bridge Road, which was being extended past Arab Street at the time, had to bend around it. The mosque was formally opened on 27 December 1929, two-thirds finished, and completed in 1932.

Two details to look for: the building faces Mecca rather than the street grid, so it sits at an angle to its neighbours; and the base of each golden dome is ringed with the ends of glass bottles, collected as donations from poorer Muslims so that everyone, not only the wealthy, could say they had helped build it.

The same decade was not the district's proudest: by the 1920s, the library notes, the kampong was better known for its red-light district than for its community. In 1950 the mosque was at the centre of the Maria Hertogh riots. It was gazetted a national monument on 8 March 1975.

1989 onwards: conservation, and the shops that followed

On 7 July 1989 the historic district — bounded by Jalan Sultan, Rochor Canal Road, Arab Street and Beach Road — was gazetted a conservation area, about 16 hectares in all. The istana became the Malay Heritage Centre, opened in June 2005, and the library records that it reopened on 25 April 2026 after three years of renovation. The istana itself became a national monument on 6 August 2015. Check the centre’s own site for opening hours before you go.

Conservation fixed the buildings, not what happened inside them, and over the following decades the shophouses filled with the boutiques, bars and restaurants you see now — ours among them. Habibi-san opened at 55 Haji Lane in December 2020 before moving its main kitchen to Hamilton Road in October 2025; we told that story here, and Li’l Habibi now runs in the original spot.

A one-look timeline

• Before 1819 — an orang laut village named for the gelam tree
• 1819 — Hussein Shah’s agreement with Raffles
• 14 March 1823 — land granted to Sultan Hussein
• 2 August 1824 — Singapore ceded to the East India Company
• 1824–1826 — the first mosque is built
• 1890 — the present istana completed
• 1 January 1905 — the estate becomes state land
• 15 April 1910 — Bussorah, Muscat and Kandahar Street names approved
• 1929–1932 — the present Sultan Mosque opened and completed
• 7 July 1989 — Kampong Glam gazetted a conservation area
• 2005, and again 2026 — the Malay Heritage Centre opens, then reopens

Where to go after the history

If you are walking it, the mosque’s visiting hours shape the day, and our Sultan Mosque food guide lines them up against lunch. For a full afternoon on the lane itself, A Day on Haji Lane is the itinerary; for the evening, the bars.

And when the light goes, Li’l Habibi opens at 5.30pm, Tuesday to Sunday, at the top of the lane: skewers off a charcoal grill, small plates and a bar. Since the street’s history invites the question: neither Li’l Habibi nor Habibi-san is halal — we serve pork and alcohol. The rest is on the Li’l Habibi page, and for the full charcoal menu, the Hamilton Road restaurant takes reservations here. The rooms are in the gallery.

Sources: National Library Board, Singapore Infopedia — “Kampong Glam” (Vernon Cornelius), “Sultan Mosque” (Joanna HS Tan) and “Istana Kampong Glam” (Vernon Cornelius), read 28 September 2026.