What Was Telok Blangah Before Telok Blangah? | Malay Settlements, Keppel Harbour and the Coast Before the HDB Estate

SINGAPORE / ESTATE HISTORY / TELOK BLANGAH

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By The Memory desk · Historical reference · Sources checked 7 October 2026

Before Telok Blangah was an HDB estate beneath Mount Faber, it was the seat of the Temenggong, one of the two Malay rulers who had signed the 1819 agreement with Stamford Raffles. In 1823 Raffles assigned Temenggong Abdul Rahman and his followers 200 acres on this bay west of the town, and his family kept their palace and royal burial ground here for the rest of the century. The hill behind it was renamed Mount Faber in 1845, and the deep channel in front became New Harbour, later Keppel Harbour.

The Telok Blangah history in this guide follows those layers in order: the Temenggong’s settlement and royal tomb, the signal hill, the docks, and the temples and housing that came after. The port story to the east is told in our history of Tanjong Pagar and its docks, and the long beach to the west in what Pasir Panjang was before Pasir Panjang.

Telok Blangah at a glance

Location	The southern coast west of Tanjong Pagar, between Mount Faber, Telok Blangah Hill and Keppel Harbour
Name	Malay: telok means bay; blanga is usually explained as a kind of clay cooking pot
Settled as	Land assigned by Raffles to Temenggong Abdul Rahman and his followers in 1823, about 200 acres for their homes and a cemetery
Landmarks then	The Temenggong’s istana (1824, rebuilt 1830, demolished 1954), the royal tomb, Telok Blangah Hill (Mount Faber from 1845), the docks of New Harbour
Known for	The Temenggong and the Johor royal family, Mount Faber, Keppel Harbour
Today	A public-housing estate and parks on the Southern Ridges, beside HarbourFront and Keppel Bay

What does Telok Blangah mean?

Telok is Malay for bay, and the name describes the curve of coast between the hills and the harbour. The second word is less settled. The National Heritage Board explains blanga as a clay cooking pot, which would make the name something like “cooking-pot bay”, and other sources give the same reading. Why the bay was named after a pot is not recorded, and spellings such as Teluk Belanga show how loosely the word was written down.

The bay was inhabited long before 1819. The National Heritage Board’s story of Keppel Bay records Orang Laut, the sea people, living on long dwelling boats in the waters that later became Keppel Harbour. The coast belonged to the maritime world of the Johor-Riau sultanate, in which the Temenggong was one of the senior officials.

1823: the Temenggong’s settlement at Telok Blangah

Temenggong Abdul Rahman was, with Sultan Hussein, one of the two Malay parties to the 1819 treaty that let Raffles open a trading post. In 1823 Raffles assigned him and his followers about 200 acres at Telok Blangah for their residence and a cemetery. The Temenggong died on 8 December 1825 and was buried at Telok Blangah, in what is now known as the Makam Diraja, the royal tomb.

Under his son, Temenggong Daeng Ibrahim, who lived from 1812 to 1862, the settlement grew rich on the trade in gutta-percha, a tree latex, according to the My Community heritage tour of the area; in 1846 Governor William Butterworth presented him with a sword for his part in suppressing piracy. One National Heritage Board story instead credits the gutta-percha monopoly to Abdul Rahman’s lifetime, before 1825. The sources disagree, and we have not been able to settle the point.

Telok Blangah was therefore not an empty coast that the port filled. This is our reading rather than a documented claim, but the record supports it: for most of the 19th century the bay was home to a Malay court with its own followers, trade and diplomacy, and the docks were built around it rather than on blank land.

The istana, the royal tomb and the move to Johor

The Temenggong’s palace, later called the Istana Lama or old palace, was built for Abdul Rahman in 1824, according to a 2020 report in The Straits Times. Daeng Ibrahim rebuilt it in concrete in 1830, and it served as the office where visiting regional dignitaries were received. His son Abu Bakar, the future Sultan of Johor, was born there on 3 February 1833.

The family’s attention then turned north. When Daeng Ibrahim died on 31 January 1862, Abu Bakar succeeded him and moved his Singapore residence to Tyersall; he later became Sultan of Johor, and the family’s future lay across the strait. The royal tomb at Telok Blangah stayed in use, and the last burial there took place in 1900. The My Community heritage tour also dates an octagonal-roofed mosque at Telok Blangah to around 1890.

The istana outlived its owners’ presence. It became the Hotel Bellevue in 1931 and, after 1951, a workers’ hostel; it was demolished in 1954 after the land was sold to the Bata shoe company, which opened a factory on the site in 1964. A condominium, Harbourlights, now stands there. None of the palace survives, but the royal tomb does.

Why is it called Mount Faber?

The hill behind the bay was known as Telok Blangah Hill until 1845. Early that year Captain Charles Edward Faber of the Madras Engineers built a narrow, winding road to the summit, and in July 1845 the hill was renamed Mount Faber in his honour. In May of the same year the colony’s signal station was moved there from Pulau Blakang Mati, now Sentosa, to watch for approaching ships.

The hilltop stayed a working site for more than a century. A new flagstaff put up in May 1851 was struck by lightning and destroyed within a month, an observatory came into use on 1 June 1905, and the signal station and flagstaff remained on the hill until the early 1970s. At about 105 metres, it is listed by the National Library as Singapore’s fourth-highest peak.

1848 to 1913: the docks of Keppel Harbour

In May 1848 Captain Henry Keppel, surveying aboard HMS Meander, found the deep-water anchorage between the Telok Blangah coast and Blakang Mati. The channel became New Harbour, and the docks that followed lined the shore from Tanjong Pagar towards the bay: No. 1 Dock in 1859, a second dock eight years later, and in 1913 the King’s Dock, advertised as the largest dock east of Suez.

In 1900 the channel was renamed Keppel Harbour, after Keppel himself returned to Singapore at the age of 92. For most of the 20th century the waterfront below Mount Faber was given over to docks and ship repair. The dock company and its takeover by the government are covered in our history of Tanjong Pagar.

Temples, kampongs and public housing

Behind the coast the hills filled with villages and places of worship. On Telok Blangah Hill the Koon Seng Ting temple was completed in 1881, founded by a Teochew woman, Teh Chit Yee, and remembered as a refuge for abandoned baby girls; it was given conservation status on 6 June 2014. Telok Blangah Road was officially named in 1907. The My Community heritage tour of the wider area also dates the Silat Road Sikh Temple to 1924 and the Church of St Teresa to 1929.

Public housing reached the district early. The Singapore Improvement Trust built flats at nearby Kampong Silat between 1949 and 1952, and the hillsides were later covered by Housing and Development Board blocks. The sources we could check do not give firm dates for the Telok Blangah estate itself, so we have left them out rather than guess. What changed the view most visibly was the cable car, which opened on 15 February 1974 and carried passengers from Mount Faber across the harbour to Sentosa.

As of October 2026, Telok Blangah is a mature housing estate with Mount Faber Park and Telok Blangah Hill Park above it, part of the Southern Ridges walking route that continues west past Alexandra towards Kent Ridge. The waterfront is now HarbourFront, whose shopping story is in our history of VivoCity at HarbourFront. The Makam Diraja and the Koon Seng Ting temple are the clearest surviving traces of the 19th-century bay.

A Telok Blangah history timeline

• 1823: Raffles assigns about 200 acres at Telok Blangah to Temenggong Abdul Rahman.
• 1824: The Temenggong’s istana is built.
• 8 December 1825: Temenggong Abdul Rahman dies and is buried at Telok Blangah.
• 1830: Temenggong Daeng Ibrahim rebuilds the istana in concrete.
• 3 February 1833: Abu Bakar, future Sultan of Johor, is born at the istana.
• July 1845: Telok Blangah Hill is renamed Mount Faber; the signal station moves there.
• May 1848: Captain Henry Keppel surveys the deep-water channel.
• 1859: No. 1 Dock, the first dry dock, is built.
• 31 January 1862: Daeng Ibrahim dies; Abu Bakar succeeds him.
• 1881: Koon Seng Ting temple is completed on Telok Blangah Hill.
• 1900: New Harbour is renamed Keppel Harbour; the last burial takes place at the royal tomb.
• 1 June 1905: An observatory comes into use on Mount Faber.
• 1907: Telok Blangah Road is officially named.
• 1913: The King’s Dock opens.
• 1931: The old istana becomes the Hotel Bellevue.
• 1949 to 1952: Singapore Improvement Trust flats are built at Kampong Silat.
• 1954: The istana is demolished.
• 15 February 1974: The Mount Faber cable car opens.
• 6 June 2014: Koon Seng Ting is given conservation status.

Questions people ask

What does Telok Blangah mean?

Telok is Malay for bay. Blanga is usually explained as a kind of clay cooking pot, which would make the name roughly “cooking-pot bay”, though the reason for it is not recorded.

Who was the Temenggong of Telok Blangah?

Temenggong Abdul Rahman, a senior Malay official of the Johor-Riau sultanate, who was assigned land at Telok Blangah by Raffles in 1823. His son Daeng Ibrahim and grandson Abu Bakar, later Sultan of Johor, followed him.

Why is it called Mount Faber?

It was renamed in July 1845 after Captain Charles Edward Faber of the Madras Engineers, who built the first road to the summit. Before that it was called Telok Blangah Hill.

What happened to the Istana at Telok Blangah?

The palace, built in 1824, became the Hotel Bellevue in 1931 and was demolished in 1954. A Bata shoe factory was later built on the site, followed by the Harbourlights condominium.

When did the Mount Faber cable car open?

On 15 February 1974, linking Mount Faber with Sentosa across Keppel Harbour.

Sources and further reading

• National Heritage Board, Roots: story on Telok Blangah and Mount Faber
• National Heritage Board, Roots: The Story of Keppel Bay
• National Library Board, Infopedia: Mount Faber
• The Straits Times: print page on the Istana Lama at Telok Blangah (14 January 2020)
• Urban Redevelopment Authority: 4 Telok Blangah Drive (Koon Seng Ting)
• My Community: My Telok Blangah Heritage Tour
• Wikipedia: Istana Lama (for the later history of the site)
• Wikipedia: Telok Blangah

This is a historical reference; dates follow the sources listed, and where they disagree we say so. Read next: Pasir Panjang and the 1942 battle · Tanjong Pagar and its docks · Back to The Memory