Kampong life, briefly
Before the housing blocks, most Singaporeans lived in kampongs — villages of wood and zinc-roofed houses, often without running water or electricity, organised loosely around shared courtyards and communal wells.
The HDB story
The Housing & Development Board, formed shortly after independence, resettled most of the population into planned housing estates within a generation — one of the more dramatic urban transformations of the 20th century, and still the framework around 80% of residents live under today.
Seeing it today
Pulau Ubin remains the clearest surviving example of kampong life. For HDB heritage, Tiong Bahru's original 1930s low-rise blocks and the older estates around Toa Payoh show the earlier chapters of public housing design.