Occasions in Singapore

Occasions in Singapore, from the Lunar New Year to Teachers' Day

Among occasions in Singapore that call for flowers, Teachers' Day is the easiest to miss: it falls on the first Friday of September, an ordinary working day, and teachers receive flowers on it all the same. Several calendars run through the city side by side, and the occasion itself tends to decide the shape and the colour of the bouquet.

Flowers for the Lunar New Year and Singapore's other public holidays

Singapore's public holidays include the Lunar New Year, Hari Raya Puasa, Vesak Day, National Day on 9 August, Deepavali and Christmas, each bringing its own household visits. The Lunar New Year moves on the calendar from one year to the next, so households watch for the date rather than circle a fixed one.

In the run-up, pussy willow branches, kumquat trees and orchids fill the markets, bought roughly one to two weeks ahead of the holiday. Pussy willow, known as yín liǔ, sounds in Mandarin like a phrase for having silver and having a home, which is why it sits in so many front rooms at that time of year. A bouquet meant for the same family visit is best ordered on the same timing, rather than left to the last few days.

Red carries the weight of celebration and good fortune for Singapore's Chinese majority, which makes red roses, such as a hand-tied bunch of eleven French roses, a safe choice for a holiday visit. What particular colours and numbers of stems mean beyond that, and where hospitals draw the line on flowers altogether, is covered on Flowers in Singapore. 8 March is not celebrated as a Singapore holiday; the local calendar is built around its own public holidays. The Chinese New Year section groups bouquets built for this particular visit.

A Teachers' Day bouquet for a working Friday in September

Teachers' Day sits on the first Friday of September and carries no day off, so the flowers for it are handed over between lessons rather than at a weekend gathering. A pupil or a parent collecting one on the way to school needs something that survives a short carry and a staffroom desk.

A small hand-tied bouquet works for that, and so does a low box that stands on a desk without anyone hunting for a vase. The card that goes with it costs nothing extra, and the message on it can be written in the sender's own words rather than picked from a set list. Graduation is a separate occasion in the section, with its own flowers for the end of the school year rather than a working Friday in the middle of it. The Teachers' Day bouquets subsection collects the formats that travel well across a morning at school.

Valentine's Day and Mother's Day: booking ahead of the peak

Mother's Day falls on the second Sunday of May and, like Valentine's Day on 14 February, is not a public holiday, so both dates land on an ordinary working calendar for most of the city. They are also the two busiest days of the year for flower delivery here: order volumes run far higher than usual, the booking slots widen, and an exact minute cannot be promised on either date.

Booking for a set date and time slot is open across every delivery zone, and the earlier the order goes in, the more of those slots are still free. A florist photographs the finished bouquet before the courier leaves, and a sender who spots something to fix can ask for a change while there is still time to make it; delivery zones and their terms are set out on the delivery terms page. Valentine's Day and Mother's Day flowers are the two subsections worth booking from well before the date itself.

A new flat, a new baby, fifty years married: family occasions

More than three in four people in Singapore live in an HDB flat, so a housewarming gift usually ends up on a table in one of those homes rather than in a landed house. A box or a basket suits that table well, since it stands on its own with no vase to find on arrival.

A new baby brings its own flowers, though maternity wards and general hospitals set their own rules about what they will let through the door, much as other hospitals in the city do. A golden wedding anniversary, marking fifty years married, is one more occasion the section keeps a bouquet for. Where there is no fixed address to send to, a recipient's phone number is enough for the courier to arrange the handover. The housewarming subsection is built around exactly this kind of HDB delivery.

A straightforward place to start is the date on the calendar: birthday flowers cover the one occasion that comes round every year regardless of festival or season. Diwali and the Chinese New Year sections are worth checking first whenever a family visit is coming up.