▷ MBK Shopping Center Bangkok

A budget mall in the heart of Bangkok

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MBK Shopping Center is an iconic budget shopping mall standing in the heart of Bangkok since 1985, best known for its bazaar product and tons of knockoff goods. The location at the top of the ‘shopping mile’ in the Siam district makes it very convenient to access, and with more than 2,000 shops and stalls, the size is enormous. While its neighbours Siam Discovery, Siam Center, Siam Paragon and CentralWorld target the upper market, MBK has always kept the budget-conscious clientele in mind and feels a bit like an indoor market, with Air Con!

7 floors cover an immense surface. Some floors seem more dedicated to a range of products, but it is a bit ‘Same Same but Different, ‘ and sometimes hard to orientate. If you like something, better buy it when you see it as you may never be able to find the shop again! At first, MBK seems overwhelming with choice, but ultimately you can expect to find tons of shoes, T-shirts, bags and phone accessories, and tourist souvenirs. The food court is fun and very Thai.

In case you were wondering where the name came from, MBK stands for Mahboonkrong, and the names of the developer’s parents are Mah and Boonkrong.

What to buy at MBK, floor by floor

Outside MBK, the front of the mall is frequently used for temporary events, street food markets, bazaars, or even Muay Thai Boxing matches. It’s kind of fun.

1st Floor

On the 1st floor are the cheap clothing stalls, mostly addressing tourists, selling those ever-popular elephant pants and Bangkok T-shirts, and tons of souvenirs for tourists. Kids’ clothing with the latest movie characters is all over the place!
Expect to find a lot of fake brand bags of various qualities. We even found Goyard bags that looked pretty real.

A fun thing to watch is the talented local painters drawing or painting surprisingly accurate reproductions of your photos for a very reasonable price.

In the south area, far from the BTS entrance, shops sell cameras, casual fashion, and sports shoes. Of course, the franchise food ballet starts with McDonald’s, Hachiban Ramen, Coffee Club, Burger King, KFC, and many more.

2nd floor

The 2nd floor is mostly shared between jewellery and gold shops, luggage and fashion accessories, with a few mainstream brands like Levi’s and more sports shoe shops. This used to be when you would buy thousand of computer game CDs, but this time is long gone.

3rd floor

MBK’s 3rd floor is similar to the 2nd floor, with more gold shops, watches, tailors, and sports brands. The central area is an immense display of low-cost cosmetics, makeup accessories, and thousands of vitamin supplements.

Expect to find a lot of casual wear, short pants, caps, and T-shirts that all have the same cut and material, just with a different colour and a different logo printed on it.

The more you go south, the more it looks like a bazaar with lots of elephant pants and Muay Thai boxing shorts. This area is divided into ‘Sois’ (lanes), just like in markets and villages. You’ll find the highest concentration of T-shirts, cheap batik clothing shops, and many tailors. It’s huge, and it can take some time to explore until you realize they all sell the same things, more or less.

4th Floor

The 4th floor is ‘Mobile Phone’ madness! This floor was extremely popular during the mobile phone craze and DVD movies and games. You can find a lot of second-hand phones at a great price, plus a million accessories. It’s also where you can find a huge amount of photo equipment and accessories, from simple gadgets to professional equipment.

This is the floor that most Bangkok photographers would visit when searching for a specific piece of equipment. Unfortunately for those shops, buying online now offers a much more comprehensive range of products and a much, much better price!

5th Floor

5th floor is empty, with a bit of furniture, sound systems and accessories, and lots of camera shops (higher level of quality, the one I used to go to), Banks (south end)

6th Floor

The 6th floor is home to a very popular Food Court selling surprisingly good Thai food and a vast range of Thai desserts and sweets. Of course, you will see more bags, teen accessories, and casual outfits, but the Craft Village at the south end is quite a nice place to buy Thai handicrafts and fabrics.

7th floor

The 7th floor is for entertainment and food: SF Cinemas City, SF Strike Bowl, 2 arcade game centres and more than 20 restaurants, all from well-known franchises such as Chesters, Pizza Hut, Black Canyon, Coco Ichiban and MK Suki.

Tokyu Department Store

Tokyu is a Japanese department store connected to MBK covering 4 storeys. Like the rest of MBK, it’s not upmarket and has nothing to compare to Tokyu Department Stores in Japan. It seems that most items are unsold articles from several years old fashion, which makes sense if they want to reach budget-conscious visitors.

More photos of MBK