Samut Prakan - Muang Boran

Muang Boran (Thai for "Ancient City"), one of the largest open-air museums in the world, was financed by a rich citizen from Bangkok and cost more than 200 million $US. Over the ten years it took to develop the 80-ha (197-acre) site, designed in the shape of Thailand, some exhibits of original size were built together with 65 copies of the most beautiful and culturally significant buildings on a scale of 1:3, some of which are based only on ruins such as the Si Sanphet Prasat, the royal audience chamber of the old Ayutthaya. The visitor can drive along roads leading to the individual sights, most of which are located in their "correct" geographical positions. Among the original buildings from different places reconstructed in Ancient City are, for example, some houses which stood by the canals of Bangkok and had to make room for road building in the 1970s. Some large scale buildings of temples and palaces, which today are either in ruins (the Throne Room Si Sanphet Prasat from Ayutthaya) or else have been completely altered in their appearance (such as the Duist Maha Prasat from the Grand Palace in Bangkok), have been reduced to one third of their original size but otherwise are an authentic reconstruction to the smallest detail. The Si Sanphet Prasat is remarkable for the high halls of its interior with their splendid wooden ceilings, gilded walls with mirror mosaics and stucco ornaments. In the Dusit Maha Prasat, a copy of the building in the Great Palace district of Bangkok, the frescos, which are true to the original, are particularly interesting, especially as very few have been preserved owing to the damage caused by the air pollution in Bangkok to paintings mostly from the early Bangkok period. They represent state ceremonies, religious festivals, military parades, and court life at the time of Rama I (1782-1809). The carved doors and windows are particularly attractive.