River City Bangkok: the anchor of arts and antiques

River City Bangkok: the anchor of arts and antiques

River City Bangkok is a 4-floor mall facing extensive views of the Chao Phraya River. It specializes in high-quality antiques and collectibles, and it’s a paradise for antique lovers and collectors, since it has a genuine abundance of art objects of Southeast Asia, including Buddha images, porcelain and ceramics, Thai Benjarong (a traditional form of Thai porcelain), maps and prints of old times, adornments of gold and silver, statues and figures, sophisticated woodcuts and much more from all over the world.

River City Bangkok, the anchor of arts and antiques was planned by Krisda Arunvongse na Ayudhya and developed by the Italthai Group and also the Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group. The mall opened in December 1984 having a total floor area of 47,567 sqm.

On one of his trips to Europe in the 1980s, the antique markets of Paris fascinated Mr. Adisorn Charanachitta, CEO of ItalThai Group. He thought how wonderful it would be to have an antique market on the shores of Chao Phraya River. And so, River City Bangkok was born, an arts and antique center with four floors of shops filled with the treasures of Asia.

River City Bangkok
The Si Phraya Pier at River City Bangkok. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

The shopping mall offers several river tours and dinner cruises and also provides boat shuttles from and to the Sathorn Pier (where you can easily connect to the Skytrain) and the ICONSIAM pier. The Si Phraya pier is the main point of entry to this complex from the river.

The seafront has plenty of riverside eateries with outdoor terraces where you can enjoy a pleasant meal while appreciating the views of the river, being one of the city’s best views of sunsets, and from where you’ll see people embarking on Bangkok’s best dinner cruises and boat tours along the Chao Phraya river. Definitely head there for a sundowner if you have the time.

River City Bangkok outdoor terraces
Riverside eateries on the seafront of River City Bangkok. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

Lessees of River City Bangkok, with a total of 160 stores, are 60 percent art as well as antique shops, 20 percent lifestyle stores specialized in leatherwork, silks, tailored fits, furnishings, and also home design, and 20 percent restaurants and coffee shops. The four floors are arranged by categories of goods and services. The RCB Artery Zone is intended to host events. RCB Galleria on the second floor is proper for showroom style art exhibitions.

River City Bangkok
Front view of one of the shops selling art and antique objects. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

The third and fourth floors of this riverside mall are packed with boutique lifestyle shops ranging from fashion to antique art (selling the very best in Thai and Southeast Asian art), as well as being the home to Thailand’s leading auction house, RCB Auctions.

Established in July 1985, Riverside Auction House (RCB Auctions) is an art and antique auction house. Since that date, RCB Auctions has held an auction on the first Saturday of every other month. Each piece at every auction is certified by the Association for the Propagation and Promotion of Objets d’Art. The proceeds from the success of these bi-monthly auctions and Grand Auctions are put towards charitable causes that help the region and community grow.

All of these events are organized for both Thais and foreigners so that everyone can learn and appreciate the historical and cultural heritage of Thailand and other countries.

River City Bangkok Helipad

When it’s not being used to deliver high-flying travelers to the banks of Bangkok’s majestic Chao Phraya River, the helipad is a favorite venue for spectacular events. From the roof of River City, you get the most beautiful panoramic view. The helipad is a truly unique venue for rooftop screenings, concerts, performance, pop-up fairs or that special product launch. What better place for partygoers and nightcrawlers to appreciate smooth yellow sky at sundown, taste some crafted beers, watch dinner cruises floating by or take some shots of New Year’s astonishing fireworks. Under the infinite sky, this multi-functional space is open for any creativity against the setting of urban living.

River City Bangkok Cultural events and expositions

The second floor of River City Bangkok has been transformed to host art in all its forms… from paintings to sculpture, digital art to live performances, film, and photography. It’s a check-in spot in town friendly for art lovers and urban lifestyle specialists.

River City Bangkok
Paintings exhibition at RCB Galleria on the second floor of River City Bangkok. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

RCB Galleria is a flexible art space able to be configured to the curator’s requirements. When combined, RCB Galleria 1 and RCB Galleria 2 provide 1,200 square meters of open exhibition space, climate-controlled and with a flexible lighting rig.

River City Bangkok is becoming a prime location to host cultural events and expositions. From 26 April 2019 to 31 July 2019 it was held an immersive multimedia exhibition named From Monet to Kandinsky that came to Bangkok after obtaining a highly acclaimed première in Berlin in 2017. This exhibition presented the most important art movements between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century: impressionism, post-impressionism, cubism, and expressionism.

River City Bangkok
Wall sign of Expo From Monet to Kandinsky. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

The showcase delivers more than 1,500 art creations including paintings of 10 exceptional masters of modernism in an unprecedented combination of HD projections, animated graphics, and music. Claude Monet, Georges Seurat, Paul Gaugin, Vincent Van Gogh, Edvard Munch, Paul Cézanne, Juan Gris, Robert Delaunay, Paul Klee, and Wassily Kandinsky. They all had in common an insuperable desire to transform art to the next level and to find new suggestive and visual forms to capture the tremendous changes of their time.

River City Bangkok
Wall sign of Expo Italian Renaissance. Photo by Discovering Bangkok

After the success of the previous immersive multimedia exhibition From Monet to Kandinsky, finished latest July 31st, 2019, River City Bangkok presented a brand-new immersive multimedia exhibit Italian Renaissance, featuring the work of arts of four exceptional artists, titans of the Renaissance: Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rafael, and also Botticelli.

They lived as well as worked more than 500 years earlier, however, their legacy endures and it’s notably appreciated around the globe. Undoubtedly they are the most remarkable mythos of the period that exemplifies the term “Renaissance Man” mastering multiple subjects as well as interests and passions.

Everything began at the inception of the 15th century in Italy. The innovations that arose in art during this epoch would certainly go on to cause echoes, which remain to influence the creative and social sectors today.

The exhibition was launched on August 8th and finished on October 31st, 2019.