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If you don’t like art, learning, environmentally friendly living, convenience, comfort or food (FOOD!), perhaps you’re right to dismiss what follows. So this is your cue to stop reading. But if you do like these things, stay with us, because Bangkok is finally getting a mixed-use urban space for the ages in the form of the 222,000sqm Samyan Mitrtown, and you’ll want to be in the know.
It takes only a quick scan of Bangkok’s skyline, or an amble down pretty much any street, to realize the sheer volume of residential space perpetually being stamped on the face of the city — as if from a template devoid of creativity and any sense of how people actually want to live. And so we rent, saving our hard-earned cash for the day that the Condo Gods strike life into our City of Angels.
Well, the Condo Gods have spoken and they have said, “Three is a magic number”, but what does it all mean?
The Samyan Mitrtown project is currently under development by a joint venture between Golden Land Property PLC and TCC Group at Samyan intersection, smack in the middle of Bangkok and, as you might expect, consists of three buildings: a 33-storey residential tower — the Triple Y Residence (set to welcome residents of this September), a seven-storey retail building and a 31-storey Grade A office tower.
“Samyan”, the eponymous neighborhood in which the project sits, literally translates to “three neighborhoods”, and is commonly understood to be a reference to its strategic location at the three-way intersection of Phayathai Road and Rama IV Road. Samyan is known for its density of long-loved street food options, local shops, and the Samyan Market, which offers an old-school alternative to the nearby mega-markets in Siam and Silom. Although some of the neighborhood has been transformed to cater to the project and the thousands of students at nearby Chulalongkorn University, it maintains an old-Bangkok charm and is worth a visit in its own right.
Samyan doesn’t quite get the name recognition its character and location deserve, but we argue there’s no better location in Bangkok. Samyan Mitrtown sits on the northwest side of the intersection, directly south of Chulalongkorn University and will be connected by an underground passageway to the Sam Yan MRT subway station (Samyan, Sam Yan, same word, different transliteration).
The Sam Yan MRT station is but one stop away from Si Lom MRT station and the Sala Daeng BTS skytrain connection to the east (Bangkok’s business epicenter), and Hua Lamphong MRT station, the Hua Lamphong SRT rail station, Chinatown and Old Bangkok to the west. IMHO, you can strike all the aspects of the development and the neighborhood itself that are unique and we’d still be sold solely by virtue of its proximity to other parts of the city.
“Condo Gods, you mean local folks there can live one subway stop from the business district and two stops from the beloved Chinatown with its irresistible bars and restaurants that most never find time to visit? And wait…millennials can enroll in one of the nation’s premier universities and simply walk to class?”
“Yes,” they said, “and by the way, we’ll give you a shuttle bus running between the project and National Stadium and Siam BTS stations, in case you don’t feel like making the 10-minute walk.”
Got a car and family outside of central Bangkok to visit on the weekends? The Chaloem Maha Nakhon Expressway is 3 kilometers away and the Sirat Expressway is 1.6 km away. In a traffic-clogged city like Bangkok, it’s almost unthinkable that such a place exists. Perhaps the only reason Samyan hasn’t made a bigger blip on condo-buyer radars is that there hasn’t really been much to buy — until now.
A friendly concept
Marketing jargon is often a target of ridicule, which is what it deserves. But let’s give Samyan Mitrtown a pass, because much of what they say makes sense and they’ve taken a leap of faith that other developers have not been willing, or able, to take. “Mitr”, the first part of “Mitrtown”, translates from the Thai language as the concept of “friendship” or “friendliness” (and pronounced in Thai, “Mitrtown” sounds like “midtown” – get it?) and Golden Land’s concept of the space is founded on three principles of “friendliness”: user friendliness, community friendliness, and environment friendliness.
The residential tower is comprised of the Triple Y Residence with one- and two-bedroom condo units on the upper floors, ranging in size from 34 to 68 sqm, and the Triple Y Hotel on the lower floors. The Triple Y Residence units will be constructed in a “blank canvas” sort of way to allow owners to outfit them and express their interior design creativity as they desire — not to take away the fact that it comes readily and fully furnished.
The whole project will feature environmentally friendly materials and design to minimize energy consumption and maximize conservation (Golden Land is behind the FYI Center at Queen Sirikit National Convention Center MRT station and Sathorn Square building at Chong Nonsi BTS station, both lauded for their environmentally friendly design). There will also be common areas for reading, playing, learning, state-of-the-art co-kitchen space for shared cooking experiences and yes, there’s a pool; yes, there’s a gym for the fitness junkies too. And for those who like to keep things neat and clean, the in-house self-laundromat will conveniently take away the laundry workload off your to-do list.
The 36,000sqm retail building is the real innovation of Samyan Mitrtown and also where the marketing jargon gets the thickest (but remember, we’ve granted a pass). Once again, we’ve got threes to deal with – in this case, the three components of the retail building: an “eating library”, a “learning library”, and a “living library”.
What this translates to is a profoundly new concept of living for Bangkok. Residents will have at their doorstep a 24-hour facility offering a wide variety of eating experiences to sample with a focus on the art and science of dining — think fresh, think variety, think care — an independent film cinema ‘House Samyan’, the mega art supply store with studio space, co-learning space, study areas, classrooms (and classes), and more. The developers have collaborated with some of Bangkok’s most celebrated artists, whose work will be displayed throughout, some of which can already be seen adorning the construction barriers. So, perhaps there’s a chance for another museum too?
At Samyan Mitrtown, you need not ever leave home! But, if you want to, remember you’re only one stop from Silom, one stop from Siam and two stops from Chinatown (that makes three).
If you’re still with us, your patience is deservingly rewarded with THB100,000 off, simply register for Triple Y Residence pre-sales event, March 10, 2019.
