OUR PUBLICATIONS

Peranakan Museum Guide

Amek Gambar - Taking Pictures: Peranakans and Photography

Nyonya Needlework: Embroidery and Beadwork in the Peranakan World

Auspicious Designs: Batik for Peranakan Altars

Great Peranakans: Fifty Remarkable Lives

Luminous Depths: A Contemporary Project on the Museum

Peranakan Museum Guide
This guide to the Peranakan Museum in Singapore features over one hundred fully illustrated entries written by the museum’s curators, independent academics, and researchers. It provides the reader with glimpses into the lifestyle of the Peranakan Chinese community in all its facets and expressions. These include everyday household objects, distinctive crafts such as beadwork and embroidery, colourful porcelain, textiles, jewellery, and the fine gilded furniture that graced the homes of the wealthier Peranakans. Intangible aspects of the culture such as language and poetic forms are explored as well. The Peranakan Guide is an indispensable companion for cultural enthusiasts seeking an accessible introduction to one of Southeast Asia’s most colourful living cultures.
ISBN: 9789811137211
Format: Print Book - Paperback
Pages: 272
Language: English
Imprint: The Peranakan Museum
Publication Date: 2017
Also available for purchase at the Peranakan Museum's Visitor Services counter, or at ACM's museum shop.

Amek Gambar - Taking Pictures: Peranakans and Photography
Amek Gambar also charts the early history of photography in Singapore, from European travellers Jules Itier, Fedor Jagor, August Sachtler, G. R. Lambert, and John Thomson to pioneering Chinese and Japanese studios in the region. Informative essays and more than 280 photographs, ranging from the 1840s to 2009, make this book a valuable historical resource, and fascinating to flip through.
ISBN: 9789811426254
Format: Print Book - Hardback
Pages: 420
Language: English
Imprint: The Peranakan Museum
Publication Date: 2020
Also available for purchase at the Peranakan Museum's Visitor Services counter, or at ACM's museum shop.

Nyonya Needlework: Embroidery and Beadwork in the Peranakan World
Cheah Hwei-Fe’n examines techniques of embroidery, work with gold thread, lace, and drawn needlework in this profusely illustrated catalogue to accompany an exhibition at the Peranakan Museum, Singapore in 2017. Ms Cheah reveals a complex network of cultural connections. Various types of needlework were practised by women and men, and drew upon techniques from Europe, India, China, and the Malay world. There are many cross-cultural surprises within: gold embroidery derives not only from European military brocade but from ancient Chinese thread techniques of gold strips wrapped around paper. And many other techniques were long practised in remote islands of the Malay Archipelago.
ISBN: 9789811108525
Format: Print Book - Hardback
Pages: 296
Language: English
Imprint: The Peranakan Museum
Publication Date: 2017
Also available for purchase at the Peranakan Museum's Visitor Services counter, or at ACM's museum shop.

Auspicious Designs: Batik for Peranakan Altars
This catalogue focuses on a group of 72 batik altar cloths recently donated to the Peranakan Museum. Families traditionally used embroidered cloths made in southern China, but in the early 20th century, the cloths began to be made of Javanese batik.
ISBN: 978-981-09-2073-9
Format: Print Book - Paperback
Pages: 139
Language: English
Publication Date: 2015
This publication is out of stock.

Great Peranakans: Fifty Remarkable Lives
A profusely illustrated, hard-bound catalogue to accompany the exhibition. Great Peranakans: Fifty Remarkable Lives presents historical essays on Peranakan culture and entries on each of the fifty men and women selected for the exhibition.
ISBN: 978-9810948658
Format: Print book - Hardcover
Pages: 200
Imprint: Asian Civilisations Museum
Published date: 2015
This publication is currently out of print.

Luminous Depths: A Contemporary Project on the Museum
This book chronicles, through an extended interview with the artist, an installation at the Peranakan Museum in 2013. Artist Lee Mingwei explored issues of archaeology, memory, connoisseurship, and rebirth in this work of art that invited visitor participation. Lee’s creation was inspired by his first visit to the museum: upon entering, he recalled his grandparents’ home, where light cascading from the skylight, sounds, and aromas coming from different floors, “became a sort of multisensory symphony in my mind.”
ISBN: 9789810933678
Format: Print Book - Hardback
Pages: 88
Language: English
Imprint: The Peranakan Museum
Publication Date: 2015
Also available for purchase at the Peranakan Museum's Visitor Services counter, or at ACM's museum shop.