Villa Samadhi Singapore

You’d be forgiven for thinking Singapore was built in defiance of nature. Its pristine roadways, gleaming skyscrapers and reclaimed land certainly suggest so. But Singapore is a self-styled ‘garden city’, and beyond the glass-and-steel melting pot of the CBD you’ll find plenty of green, especially at colonial-era Villa Samadhi, hidden by jungle in the coast-hugging Labrador Nature Reserve.

It's a real contrast when our taxi turns off the West Coast Highway and into the trees’ tropical embrace, leaving the skyscrapers and six-lane expressway behind. The hotel drive winds its way uphill towards this former army garrison, built in the 1920s with dramatic gable-roofed overhangs and rows of white shuttered windows.

We're swiftly despatched to our room: a cool, low-lit refuge from the 32-degree heat outside, where beyond our immaculately tiled bathroom we discover an inviting plunge pool that doubles as a Jacuzzi. Nearby, too, is an ayurvedic copper jug, of which the sweet, crisp spring water inside contains anti-microbial and anti-carcinogenic healing properties. Whatevs, we thirstily guzzle a few cups (also made of copper). Moments later, two staff members in crisply-ironed culottes arrive with a fold-out table set with scones, cream and (for an East Asian twist) dragon-fruit jam. We scoff them down, considering with full mouths how challenging it must’ve been to bake such doughy deliciousness in all this tropical heat.

Back in the main house we find the library which, with only two bookcases, should perhaps be more accurately labelled the drinking den, with its impressive colonial-era bar, leather armchairs (suitable for reclined sipping), dark-wood floorboards and wrought-iron chandeliers. Hanging from ruby-red walls are a pair of painted silk panels and an antique dragon-print kimono that wouldn’t have looked out of place at Hogwarts.

Our entry to the ‘library’ coincided, quite happily, with cocktail hour. Before long, the room is filled with guests sipping free dirty martinis and negronis. Whistles whetted, we're ready for dinner. The hotel’s Tamarind Hill restaurant is reached along a wooden walkway hung with cinematically oversized lanterns. The path winds its way through the jungle with plenty of drama – the precursor to the culinary theatre that awaits. The Thai dining at Tamarind Hill is a triumph: all succulent prawns, garlic squid, zingy chillies and fragrant lemongrass – paired with fruity, thirst-quenching sparkling wine.

Waking extra early next morning to beat the heat, we head into the CBD on the MRT (my, how the Singaporeans love an acronym) from Labrador Park station. The rumours are true – this is one of the cleanest, most seamless subway systems in the world.

First on the itinerary is the Kew-Gardens-on-steroids experience that is Gardens by the Bay. Its bio-domes are enormous globular structures stuffed with all sorts of bizarre plant life, including a very phallic cactus that had Mrs Smith giggling to herself for the rest of the day. Later, we lunched at Telok Ayer Victorian Hawker Market, where a slice of foodie heaven won’t cost you more than a pint of London pale ale.

Back at Villa Samadhi, we opt for a stroll through the hotel's jungly surrounds. Here, its role as an early 20th-century army garrison is brought into stark focus: if WWII played out how Churchill expected, there’s every chance Villa Samadhi wouldn’t be here at all. The area's history is laid out on information posts along a well-marked route, and it’s fascinating: Britain and its allies thought the Japanese would invade Singapore from the south – along the jungly coast on which this former army garrison sits. Much to the allies’ embarrassment, the attack came over land from the north, which is why a series of never-used, 37-tonne naval guns lie dormant here on the cliffside, hidden by creepers a stone's throw from the villa. It’s likely this former halfway house was occupied by Japanese generals during the latter part of the war, adding more mystique to this unusually green and quiet corner of Singapore.

It certainly offers an alternative to the steel-and-glass edifices of the CBD: a sanctuary of East Asian calm, seemingly out of place and out of time.