A Note for Someone: Live Poems by Adam Tie at Alchemist Tampines Mall

Alchemist’s year-end campaign, notes for the season, pairs a coffee with a few words for someone. For two hours, Singaporean poet Adam Tie of The Novel Encounter sits in the store: tell him a memory, a thank-you or something you have been meaning to say, and he turns it into a personalised poem on a gift card to go with the coffee you choose.

Adam Tie has been writing poems for strangers for years. He runs The Novel Encounter, which sells mystery books wrapped up with just a line of description, and he is best known for typing custom poems on a vintage typewriter at markets and events from three words and a short backstory. He has also published a poetry collection, Finders & Keepers (Landmark Books, 2018), and a novel, This Life Electric, which moves elements of The Great Gatsby to a Singapore shophouse.

This is one of four sessions, all 2pm to 4pm: Tampines Mall (Sat 31 Oct), 71 Robinson (Fri 6 Nov), The Heeren (Sat 7 Nov) and Plaza Singapura (Sat 14 Nov). The poem goes with a coffee bought in store, and this season’s festive blend is Fruit Cake, with notes of blueberry, black cherry and red currant.

The Tampines Mall store is Alchemist’s newest, and takes its cues from the trees that once defined Tampines: warm wood, greenery and quiet corners, set a little apart from the mall’s main flow. It opens 8am to 8pm on weekdays and 9am to 9pm at weekends.

Prefer a typewriter? At Boutiques Singapore at the F1 Pit Building (20 to 22 November), the Alchemist team will be at an on-site typewriter, typing personalised gift notes for purchases. Online orders in Singapore can also come with a typewritten message.

No session that day? Adam has also written three original poems for the campaign, about coffee rituals, the people we make room for and the places that feel like comfort. Through 15 January, eligible in-store purchases come with your pick of one of those poems or a blank card for your own words, and any four qualifying retail products come with a free campaign tote bag. Fruit Cake is also the second espresso option at Alchemist’s Singapore stores while it lasts, so you can taste it before you buy.