World Elephant Museum | Bangkok Project Studio

As a big honor to the elephant who had enormous rules in Thai culture history, Bangkok Project Studio working with the local government of Surin made a big project to respect and maintain Thai elephant survival. The project is the World Elephant Museum located in Surin Province, a lowland area in Thailand. Surin is one of Thailand’s provinces well-known for its historical identity.

This conservation project consists of a museum building, an observation deck, a large covered ground for hosting cultural events, and a workspace for the provincial government to organize event administration in the museum area. The architect wanted this project to work as an outdoor space with the interaction space between humans and elephants which in history played a major role in the mobility of war at that time. Viewed from above, this building is seen as a maze with various partitions of space. The partition is useful as a center of human interaction space such as exhibition halls or coffee shops or other facilities such as toilets or storage areas. Visitors can also see elephants walking in the area. The building is designed without a roof in the entire area of the space, reflecting direct sunlight for visitors. Nearly 480,000 fired clay bricks were used for the construction of the museum.