Bangkok (Lonely Planet) - Andrew Burke [96]
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Stores on the 3rd floor offer the same level of sophistication for your home. Thann Native sells locally inspired soaps and shampoos fragrant enough to eat. The open-air D&O Shop is the first retail venture of an organisation created to encourage awareness of Thai design abroad.
In addition to shops, Gaysorn also offers a Lifestyle Consultant ( 0 2656 1177). Available by appointment, but free of charge, the service consists of two ‘experts’, a local fashion designer and a makeup artist, whose goal is to guide you to that perfect outfit, shade of mascara, or spa treatment.
MAHBOONKRONG (MBK)
Map Shopping Centre
0 2620 9111; www.mbk-center.com; cnr Th Phra Ram I & Th Phayathai, Siam Sq; 10am-10pm; National Stadium exit 4
This unbelievably immense shopping mall is quickly becoming one of Bangkok’s top attractions. Half of the city filters through the glass doors on weekends, stutter-stepping on the escalators, stuffing themselves with junk food or making stabs at individualism by accessorising their mundane school uniforms with high slits or torturous heels. You can buy everything you need here: mobile phones, accessories, shoes, name brands, wallets, handbags, T-shirts. The middle-class Tokyu department store also sells good-quality kitchenware.
The 4th floor resembles something of a digital produce market. A confusing maze of stalls sell all the components to send you into the land of cellular – a new phone, a new number and a SIM card. Even if you’d rather keep yourself out of reach, do a walk-through to observe the chaos and the mania over phone numbers. Computer print-outs displaying all the available numbers for sale turn the phone numbers game into a commodities market. The luckier the phone number, the higher the price; upwards of thousands of dollars have been paid for numbers composed entirely of nines, considered lucky in honour of the current king, Rama IX, and because the Thai word for ‘nine’ is similar to the word for ‘progress’.
MBK is also one of the more convenient one-stop shopping destinations for photo equipment. Foto File, on the ground floor, has a good selection of used gear, though be sure to inspect the quality closely. The shop’s sister venture, Photo Thailand, stocks all manner of new photo-related gear on the 3rd floor. Sunny Camera, also on the 3rd floor, contains shelves of gleaming new Nikon and Mamiya equipment.
SIAM CENTER & SIAM DISCOVERY CENTER
Map Shopping Centre
cnr Th Phra Ram I & Th Phayathai, Siam Sq; 10am-10pm; Siam exit 1
These linked shopping malls are surprisingly subdued, almost comatose compared with frenetic Mahboonkrong. Thailand’s first shopping centre, Siam Center was built in 1976 but, since a recent nip and tuck, hardly shows its age. Its 3rd floor is one of the best locations to check out local labels such as Fly Now, Senada Theory and Tango.
In the attached Siam Discovery Center, the 4th floor continues to be a primary outpost for the Thai design scene. Panta creates modern furnishings and objets d’art out of uniquely Asian materials, such as water hyacinth and bamboo. Bangkok-based French designer Gilles Caffier and his store, 2 Gilles Caffier, sells hand-beaded vases, palm-wood chopsticks and other Asian-esque decorative objects that have landed his designs in Alain Ducasse’s restaurant. Doi Tung-Mae Fah Luang is a royally funded crafts shop selling handmade cotton and linen from villages formerly involved with poppy production. Check out the beautiful handmade rugs. On the same floor is a huge branch of Asia Books, which carries a wide selection of design magazines, Thailand fiction titles, and new guidebooks.
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top picks
FIVE FAB THAI FASHION LABELS
Fly Now Local luxury.
It’s Happened to Be a Closet Bohemian chic.
Jaspal (Siam Center, Click here) Stylish casual.
Senada Theory (Siam