The Shophouse 1527 Terranium Art
Tanisorn Vongsoontorn/Time Out Bangkok

Best art venues in Chula-Samyan

Exhibition spaces. Art galleries. Libraries. Chula-Samyan is set to become the city's artsiest quarter.

Written by
Time Out Bangkok editors
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The BACC is always an option, but you can also check out new galleries JWD and The Shophouse 1527, which fill up their bare walls with cool artwork by local emerging talents.

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TCDC Commons Ideo Q
  • Attractions
  • Libraries, archives and foundations
  • Chula-Samyan

Another TCDC-backed venue that allows you to cuddle up with creative ideas, this initiative is a joint project with real estate company, Ananda Development. The library is dedicated to communications design, and is ideally located at the IDEO Q condo close to Chulalongkorn University, an institution that embodies creativity in different fields.

  • Art
  • Arts centers
  • Siam

This imposing structure is one of the best modern art museums in the country, featuring exhibitions of established and emerging artists from Thailand and around the world.

This cylindrical building is in itself a work of art. Thai motifs are harmoniously incorporated into a modern structure envisioned by Robert G. Boughey and Associates. Its curved roof takes cues from elements dominant in the costumes of traditional Thai dancers. Slanted walls and narrow windows, which are common in Thai architecture, are also featured in the structure. 

Read the feature we produced to celebrate the first decade of the BACC here

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  • Attractions
  • Libraries, archives and foundations
  • Siam

Hidden in the lower level of the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC), the Art Library is where thousands of art books have found a home. The space, bathed in warm natural light, offers a relaxing and comfortable atmosphere for indulging in a good book. There’s also a kid’s corner where children can get their first glimpse of the art world.

  • Attractions
  • Libraries, archives and foundations
  • Phaya Thai

Jim Thompson is Thailand’s—or perhaps Southeast Asia’s—largest silk company, so it makes sense that it subsidizes a library that’s dedicated to tomes and literature on Oriental textiles. Discreetly tucked in a modern building next to the famous Jim Thompson House, the William Warren Library was named after the first author and biographer who dedicated most of his work and efforts to educating people on the life and accomplishments of Jim Thompson himself. Opened in 2007, this compact reading room features more than 3,000 books on textiles, and the different weaving cultures in Southeast Asia and elsewhere. Members can borrow up to three books a time for up to ten days.

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Jim Thompson's House
  • Museums
  • History
  • Siam

The revival and global fame of Thai silk owes much to Jim Thompson, a US architect who came in Thailand at the end of World War II with the OSS (now the CIA) and settled. Thompson spotted the marketing potential of the declining silk weaving industry, then still practised by the Muslims of Baan Khrua, and used it to create a lucrative company selling luxurious fabrics and home decor. In 1959, he adapted six reassembled teak houses into a modern living compound. Now a museum in lush grounds, it exhibits Thompson's Asian artefacts and looks much like it did when he disappeared in Malaysia's Cameron Highlands in 1967. Conspiracy theories surround his unexplained disappearance. After taking a short guided tour through Thompson’s former abode, relax in the canalside bar/restaurant Thompson, browse the onsite silk shop or view the Jim Thompson Center for the Arts, which holds world-class exhibitions on regional textiles and culture. Nearby, the William Warren Library, named after Jim's friend and biographer, also hosts talks.

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