Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall

The Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall stands within the grounds of Dusit Palace, in the Bangkok district of the same name. It closes the vista of Ratchadamnoen Avenue. Before it stretches the Royal Plaza, where the equestrian statue of King Chulalongkorn (1853–1910), the monarch who commissioned it, rises. Uthong Nai Road runs alongside the building. Close by is the Amphorn Sathan Residence, also built for Chulalongkorn and now the official residence of King Vajiralongkorn (born 1952). The hall therefore belongs to a palace complex still inhabited by the royal family, rather than being an isolated monument in the city.¹⁹

In Thai, the building is a phra thinangThai term denoting a hall or pavilion reserved for the sovereign, notably a throne hall., a term denoting a hall or pavilion reserved for the sovereign. It was designed as a thong phra rongThai term denoting an audience hall in which the king receives., that is, an audience hall in which the king receives, and as the palace’s reception hall. Its European style and its marble set it apart: it is the only marble throne hall in the country. Its size also helps to distinguish it from the much smaller Abhisek Dusit Throne Hall, which stands behind it and with which visitor maps often confuse it.¹

The name Ananta Samakhom predates this building. It referred to a throne hall from the reign of Mongkut (1804–1868), King Rama IV, Chulalongkorn’s father. The first hall of that name had reportedly been built for an “endless association”, the meaning ascribed to the name itself. Under Chulalongkorn, this old hall and the Phra Abhinao Niwet group of buildings were badly dilapidated. The king had them demolished.³

The new building at Dusit was to replace the old hall and took over its name, announced by the Ministry of the Palace before work began. This choice placed a building of thoroughly European appearance in the line of the dynasty’s throne halls. The form changed entirely, but the title remained the same.¹⁴

In 1899 Chulalongkorn, fifth king of the Chakri dynasty, began building the Suan Dusit Palace, the original name of Dusit Palace. He wished to add a reception hall that would do Siam honour. The commission for the new throne hall came about a year after the completion of the Amphorn Sathan Residence, finished in 1906. The foundation stone was laid on 11 November 1908. The date was no accident: it marked the fortieth anniversary of the king’s first coronation. The project thus became a jubilee of the reign set in stone.¹⁰

The king followed the work closely. In a letter to the Minister of Public Works, he expressed his satisfaction that the project was proceeding on schedule. The choice of Western architecture for the most solemn of the palace’s halls was nonetheless debated. It has been argued that Chulalongkorn adopted this style reluctantly. This reading is a reminder that turning to Europe was not a foregone conclusion, even for a sovereign who had travelled and employed foreign technical experts.²

Direction of the project fell to Chao Phraya Yommarat (Pan Sukhum), who oversaw it as mae kongThai term denoting the person in charge of directing a building project, equivalent to the master builder., that is, master builder. The design and decoration were entrusted to Mario Tamagno (1877–1941), a Turin architect in the service of the court, who was also responsible for Hua Lamphong railway station. Annibale Rigotti (1870–1968), another Turin architect and town planner, who arrived in Siam in 1907, is also associated with the building. The exact contribution of each remains difficult to establish. Thai accounts mention only Tamagno, whereas English-language publications describe a collaboration between the two architects from 1908 to 1915. Above all, the discrepancy shows that the work was conceived by a team rather than by a single author.¹⁵

Other Italians worked alongside them. The engineer Carlo Allegri took charge of the structure. The sculptor Vittorio Novi contributed together with his nephew Rudolfo Nolli. For a Siamese throne hall, a veritable Italian workshop was assembled, from design to ornament.¹⁰

Chulalongkorn died in 1910, when the building was far from finished. His son Vajiravudh (1881–1925), who became king as Rama VI, continued the project. The building was completed in 1915. An opening ceremony was held in January of 1916 or 1917: converting dates from the Siamese calendarDating system in use in Siam, whose era and start of the year differed from the Gregorian calendar, which makes converting some dates difficult. then in use leaves the year in doubt.¹⁰

The hall, designed to celebrate one reign, was thus inaugurated under the next. This shift is reflected in the interior decoration, whose programme ends with the coronation of Vajiravudh.

The building is faced with white Carrara marble imported from Italy. Its style draws on the Renaissance and on neoclassicismArtistic and architectural movement drawing on the forms and principles of Graeco-Roman antiquity, which emerged in Europe in the 18th century.. Some writers describe it as Neo-RenaissanceHistoricist architectural style that revived the forms of the Italian Renaissance in the 19th century and around the turn of the 20th century., that is, a revival, at the turn of the 20th century, of the forms of the Italian Renaissance. The building has two storeys. It is dominated by a great central dome some 50 metres high, surrounded by six smaller domes.¹

Seen from the Royal Plaza, the whole reads first as a silhouette of domes and white façades, with nothing to recall the tiered roofs of traditional throne halls. This contrast is what makes it unique. The form comes from Europe, but the function, that of a royal audience and reception hall, remains that of a phra thinang.

Tamagno is said to have drawn inspiration from St Peter’s Basilica in Rome and St Paul’s Cathedral in London, two great buildings with a central dome. The comparison helps in understanding the hall’s composition: a principal dome that orders the whole, around which the secondary volumes are arranged.¹⁰

These references derive from a tradition about the architect’s work rather than from statements in his own hand. They do, however, show how the building was perceived: as the adaptation, to an Asian throne hall, of a monumental language born in the great churches of Europe.

The throne room proper occupies the upper floor. It is reached in particular through the East Staircase hall, whose ceiling already bears frescoes. The royal throne is placed beneath the central dome, at the point where the axis of the building and the visitor’s gaze converge. The entire layout of the building thus leads towards the sovereign seated beneath the highest of the domes. The painted decoration covering these domes gives meaning to this progression.¹⁰

The painted decoration was entrusted to Galileo Chini (1873–1956), a Florentine painter and decorator. He was recruited under Chulalongkorn and signed his contract with the Siamese court in 1911. Then, during the first year of Vajiravudh’s reign, he began to study classical Siamese ornament and the history of the country. The court invited him to the 1911 coronation so that he could later depict it.¹²

This period of apprenticeship matters for understanding the work. Chini did not simply apply a European repertoire to the walls. He sought to depict Siamese subjects accurately, on the basis of what he observed and what he was taught.

The frescoes by Chini and his assistants cover the ceilings and walls of the domes. They recount the history of the Chakri dynasty from the first to the sixth reign, from Rama I (1737–1809), founder of the dynasty, to Vajiravudh. The work took two years and involved a team of Italian decorators. The programme turns the hall into a dynastic narrative. Above the throne, the visitor sees the history of the successive reigns that led to the reigning sovereign.¹²

Chini’s documentary care is evident in the detail of the scenes. For the scene devoted to Rama I, he studied the anatomy of the elephant. For the coronation of Rama VI, he observed the court musicians, their drums and their ceremonial trumpets. These studies account for the impression of precision the frescoes convey, painted using European techniques yet grounded in observation of the Siamese court.¹²

A preparatory sketch by Chini for a ceiling fresco, painted on a canvas of roughly nine metres by five, had been lost. Once rediscovered, it underwent a three-year restoration. A replica is on display at the National Gallery in Bangkok. This document shows the stage of the project preceding the painting of the domes, and today it offers a way of approaching Chini’s work while the hall itself is no longer accessible.⁶

Less than twenty years after its completion, the hall changed role. During the four days of the 1932 revolution, from 24 to 27 June, which ended absolute monarchy, it served as headquarters of the People’s Party (Khana Ratsadon), the group behind the change of regime. On 28 June the first People’s National Assembly met there. The hall built for the king’s audiences thus received the first representatives of the new regime.¹¹

On 10 December 1932 the royal ceremony at which King Prajadhipok (1893–1941), Rama VII, granted the first permanent constitution was held there. The choice of venue was significant: the transition to constitutional government took place in the most solemn setting the monarchy possessed. The hall of 1932 has been described as a liminal space, a place of passage between the old regime and the new, where royal forms framed a sovereignty in the process of changing hands.¹¹

From 1932, following on from the June meeting, the hall became the seat of the Thai Parliament, and remained so until 1974.¹⁷

Throughout these decades, Chini’s dynastic decoration served as the backdrop to the deputies’ debates. In 1974 Parliament moved into a new building constructed just to the north, on royal land granted by King Bhumibol (1927–2016), Rama IX. This building was inaugurated on 19 September 1974. The throne hall then lost its everyday parliamentary use, without being cut off from the life of the state.¹⁷

The hall indeed retained a ceremonial function. On 19 January 1961, while it still housed the deputies, a royal grand audience ceremony was held there. After 1974 it remained the venue for the State Opening of Parliament, during which the king delivers the speech from the throne. It also hosts other state ceremonies.¹¹

This function extends the building’s twofold history. A royal audience hall and the cradle of Parliament, it brought together each year, at the opening of the sessions, the sovereign and the elected representatives. In 2019 Parliament moved into a new complex, the Sappaya-Sapasathan, which altered the context of this ceremony.¹⁸

For a long time, the hall opened to the public only one day a year, on Children’s Day, the second Saturday in January. It later opened more widely to visitors by hosting the permanent exhibition “Arts of the Kingdom”. This presented works from the Sirikit Institute, which grew out of the SUPPORT Foundation, established in 1976 by Queen Sirikit (1932–2025) to support craft skills. Successive editions followed: the fifth dates from 2007, and the sixth opened in December 2011, inaugurated by Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn (born 1955), daughter of King Bhumibol.⁷

The exhibition gave the hall a third use, after the court and Parliament. Beneath the frescoes of the Chakri dynasty, visitors discovered contemporary craftwork made using traditional techniques. The exhibition has since been transferred to the Arts of the Kingdom Museum at Bang Pa-In, in Ayutthaya Province.²⁰

On 1 October 2017 the hall closed to the public indefinitely. The closure had been announced a few weeks earlier, and many visitors came at the time to see the building one last time. The hall has been undergoing works ever since, and no reopening date has been announced.⁹

The monument remains visible from outside, at the far end of the Royal Plaza, but its frescoes, its staircase and its throne room are now hidden from public view. For the time being, Chini’s work can be seen only through the restored sketch on display at the National Gallery in Bangkok.⁶