Friday, December 02, 2011

Secret Garden of 1 Utama: New Times

The Secret Garden of 1 Utama will, from December 2011, be open on Public Holidays, Saturdays and Sundays. Also, the hours will be extended from 10 am to 10 pm. Lights have been installed to enable visitors to experience the garden at night. Entrance continues to be free.

A new coloured brochure is being prepared and should be available by Christmas.

The walkways have been upgraded and should not be slippery anymore. A new fountain is being installed in the Kinta Orchid area. We will be putting in new plants that emit fragrance at night and plants that stand out in soft light, i.e. plants with white or silvery leaves and flowers.

The night garden will be a new experience for us. The public, as always, are welcome to share in the experience and to make comments and suggestions.

I met an American couple from Missouri (which has one of the best botanic gardens in the world) in the Secret Garden last week. They come to Malaysia every year and make it a point to visit the Secret Garden. Each year, they notice that the garden looks much better than the year before. I have also met a Professor from Holland--a professor of the history of ideas--who visits the Secret Garden every year, and blogs about it.

3 comments:

Sean L said...

Hi Dr, so the garden renovation is complete? Looking forward to the flowers that emit fragrance at night.

Autumn Belle said...

The repeat visits of foreign experts and tourists are testimonial to a job well done. Cheers to that!

Hurray! It is indeed good news about the night opening of TSG. I'm sure the night experience will be different, with night bloomers that emit wonderful frangrances, perhaps we get to view some moths and other nocturnal creatures too. Now, I am already dreaming of Dragon fruit and Epiphylum oxypetallum! How nice it will be to view flowers and silhouettes of trees/palms under the light of the silvery moon, LED, spot lights and stars.

Dr Francis Ng said...

It will be some time before we can get the night experience to match our dreams.

I do not know of any garden that is open to the public at night anywhere in the world. There are three main reasons for closing at night. They are security of people, security of plants, and cost of operation, including the cost of staff overtime. The Secret Garden, located on the 7th floor, with access by lift, and patrolled by security guards should be absolutely safe. As for vandalism and theft of plants, visitors have been very good in the daytime, so we expect similarly good behavior at night. Night opening in spite of the extra cost was entirely the idea of the boss, Dato'Teo. He is thereby setting a new benchmark for shopping malls not only in Malaysia but also worldwide.