Museum Siam turned a 1922 building by Italian architect Mario Tamagno into a place that asks the question: what does being Thai actually mean? ‘Decoding Thainess’ runs 14 rooms: history, food, fashion, belief, the messy parts.
There’s a kitchen where you scan codes for tom yum and pad thai backstories. A room full of instant noodles, rubber-banded coffee bags and a 4m Nang Kwak statue. Daily objects that somehow explain more than plaques ever could.
The Royal barge floats next to beat-up longtail boats – fancy fruit carvings beside vendor carts. Which Thailand’s real? Another room: 108 belief objects, workshops where you try fortune telling yourself.