Lion City Kitty, Singapore’s first cat museum launches

SINGAPORE — Singapore’s first cat museum in collaboration with the Cat Welfare Society, Lion City Kitty, was officially launched by Law and Foreign Minister K Shanmugam today (Jan 9) after it held several public previews sessions in December last year.

Housed in a heritage shophouse along 8 Purvis Street, the museum will help people learn more about cats through interactions with the felines, shared Ms Jessica Seet, founder of the three-storey exhibition.

“Our mission as a social enterprise is to change the community’s mindset towards cats and animals, and to create an interest in our local kitties…We also want to inspire our local artistic community to create art around the real cats on our premises, and find homes for the orphaned kitties, while working closely with the Cat Welfare Society in Singapore,” the 48-year-old former Gold 90.5FM DJ who runs her own voice-coaching company, Art Of Voice, added.

The cat museum has also launched a campaign, “SG50 Lion City Kitties Find A Home”, with the goal to rehome 50 cats. They hope to celebrate SG50 by helping orphan cats find homes by this year’s national day.

The felines up for adoption will be housed at the third level, to allow potential adopters see the cats in their most natural state, and hopefully convince more people to adopt. The campaign began on Dec 9 last year and 12 cats have already been adopted.

Aside from specially-curated cat photographs and art and crafts from around the world, Lion City Kitty features the history of cats around the world as well as touching stories of cats and their humans. These excerpts also highlight the important roles these felines play in each community.

Ms Seet said opening hours would be kept short, from Friday to Sunday, 2pm to 9pm weekly, to avoid stressing the felines in the museum. At each time, only 20 people will be allowed in the museum to avoid overcrowding.

There will also be an admission fee of S$9 while entry for children below six years old will be free of charge.