The mind of Janice Wong must be a fascinating place to be. Part art gallery, part ideas factory, her creations make Willy Wonka look like an amateur. The chef, artist and author is most well known for pushing the boundaries of traditional dessert and pastry making, with her unique inventions drawing plenty of critical and commercial acclaim. In short, she gives desserts the attention they deserve, propelling them from the humble to the sublime.

Wong’s original restaurant 2am: Dessertbar is a Singapore institution, while offshoots include a permanent space in London’s Selfridges where customers can pick up her signature chocolate bon bons. Her edible art installations are mind blowing in scope, and have attracted global luxury brands who she’s collaborated with. She’s even started to grow cocoa beans in Singapore, producing the country’s first homegrown chocolate. Indeed, when it comes to sweet treats, there’s not much she hasn’t done. Here, she discusses her career beginnings, how travel helps broaden the mind, and why it’s good to be different.

There was a moment in my life where I realised I wanted to pursue pastry. It was in the middle of my university years. I made this big switch from studying economics and decided to pursue patisserie. I worked in a lot of Michelin restaurants, learning how to do the cuisine side of things because I wanted to be as diverse as possible. I went to a winery to learn how to make wines. I spent a week there, and just learned about all sorts of cuisines from dim sums to Spanish styles of cooking. I went to Noma for a few weeks, and learnt how to forage. I built up a wealth of knowledge that I gathered over the years of moving around, and then I decided to come back to Singapore, and open up 2am: Dessertbar.

The Dessertbar is a space where we create new experiences and really push the boundaries of sweetened beverages. I started it about 16, 17 years ago. For us, we want to continue to always push the boundary of what’s next.

I really wanted to build a brand. And so the investment was in innovation, and continuing to push and experiment with confectionaries. I’m constantly asking what’s next? Where do we go with chocolate and what can we do differently?

What’s very important is to really focus on what is not out there, what has not been done. So for example, when we launched the chocolate paints and crayons and edible art, these things hadn’t previously been attempted. So it was always about trying to find things in the unknown.

We started to grow Singapore chocolate in 2021. No one else has ever done it. No one has made Singapore chocolate. So why not try it? I always like the idea of finding these new things and it was not forceful or anything. It was really a lot of organic natural inspiration, I would say. But I was always curious and constantly focused on pushing for change.

Just being in a foreign country and exploring their cuisine, it gives you a lot of diversity of colour and taste. Culture is all about colour and taste. I mean, you go to Mexico and it’s full of colour. Then you go to another country and it’s completely different. And I think that’s very important for us artists to constantly be surrounded by these textures.

I think it’s very important for us to travel but also because of where we’re located. Singapore is a tiny island. It’s a small city, and it’s a city. So we don’t have a lot of nature, which means it’s very business centric. It’s very efficient. However, we just work nonstop, so our work life balance is not really great. Many people will vouch for that in Singapore.

I want to make even more of an impact in our company. So that’s very important for me to strive for a larger impact, leaving a better footprint in our industry. So of course, we’re doing carbon accounting. We’re also opening in Sydney as well as to other markets. So that’s really important. For us to continue to drive for expansion.

Learn more about Janice’s work at janicewong.online