Founded by a group of Chinese businessmen led by Mr Tan Chu Nan, Mr Teo Eng Hock and other Chinese businessmen, the school aimed to provide the daughters of Chinese immigrants with a proper education. Lessons were initially taught mainly in Hokkien until the 1930s when they switched to Mandarin. When the school relocated to King's Road, it was renamed Nanyang Girls' High School in 1927. It later moved to its current location at Linden Drive in 1999 with the late Mrs Ong Teng Cheong, the wife of Singapore's first elected President as the main architectural designer for the new school building.