SLEEP

A sleep sanctuary inside a working hotel.

Naumi Hotel, Singapore. Photography: Fabian Ong.

Nowhere for light to hide

Commissioned for Singapore Design Week, SLEEP: Diving In turned a live guest room at Naumi Hotel Singapore into an overnight sleep-hygiene experience. Guests checked in, followed a series of self-guided rituals designed to reset disrupted circadian rhythms, and spent the night in a working hotel room, not a showroom mock-up.

As object designers, we treated the room like a product. Walls, ceiling and floor, cabinetry, curtains, custom rugs, lights and furniture, down to the bedsheets, towels and slippers, were specified in matte black, so not a single reflection survives.

Every ritual is grounded in published sleep research and explained in a set of cards guests take home. The project was advised by psychiatrist Dr Charmaine Tang of Singapore’s Centre of Excellence for Youth Mental Health (CHAT).

Rituals for the hour before dark

Blue-light discipline
Phones sealed in a signal-blocking pouch: screens off before sleep, without relying on willpower.
Botanicals
Chamomile tea, the herbal tea richest in natural melatonin.
Circadian nutrition
A banana two hours before bed. Its tryptophan becomes the body’s own melatonin.
Aromatherapy
Lavender, shown to deepen slow-wave sleep.
Warm footbath
A 40°C hinoki-scented footbath that cools the body’s core and speeds sleep onset.
Decluttering the mind
Worries written down and shut in a box, not carried into the dark.