Terminal 21 Shopping Center in Bangkok

A upscale chic shopping center in Bangkok, Thailand, at Asok station has a unique airport design.

Bangkok's new Terminal 21 shopping plaza is loaded with 7 floors of shopping, a cinema and arcade on the top floor, and lots of food. The theme of the shopping plaza is "world travel" and it mimics an airport. There are fake security gates at each floor, and each level is named after a city, such as Istanbul, Paris, and London. Each floor has a theme for shopping and eating. The Tokyo floor has Japanese restaurants and stores for shopping the latest Japanese fashion products.
There are airline arrival boards that advertise sales going on at that time somewhere in the shopping center. I especially like the alternate escalators that skip floors, taking you from 1 to 4 in a long hop. The design has a sci-fi feel.

Most of the shopping at Terminal 21 is high-end and expensive, but a few discount boutiques are peppered in. I like the fact that only a few anchor stores are chains, and the rest are independently owned. You don't see many private shops in the US anymore, so it's refreshing to see the "family stores" thriving in Thailand.


Restaurants outnumber the shops - this is a great place to meet friends for dinner. Food is a prime theme at Terminal 21, so enjoy it! You'll find a more eclectic selection here than most other shopping plazas.


San Francisco Floor (4 ^thfloor)
Tacos! One of the few places to find tacos in Bangkok is at Sunrise Taco on the SanFran floor, where you'll also see a 40 foot replica of the Golden Gate Bridge. For a change from yummy Thai food, a Taco is a rare find in Thailand.

Caribbean Level - Food Court
The LG level (or basement) has a nice food court that is long on food and short on chairs. It seems you're meant to grab your ice cream or chicken satay, and walk around with it. There is only a stone fountain to sit on, and a couple chairs here and there. The food selection and quality are appealing, but you'll need to go higher up to the sit-down restaurants if you want to sit down.

Cinema and Arcade
The top floor has a multiplex cinema and a mid-sized video arcade. I've seen bigger and better in Bangkok, but this one does have the latest games and is in perfect condition. The whole plaza is kept spotlessly clean and safe.

(lamps on the Turkish floor at Terminal 21)

How to Get There
Terminal 21 is located right at the Asoke BTS sky-train station. You can walk directly from the sky-train platform into the shopping center. Using the MRT subway, go to the Sukhumvit station and walk around the corner to find Terminal 21- or take the escalators upstairs from MRT to the BTS station, and cross into Terminal 21. By taxi, go to Sukhumvit soi 19. It's near the heart of Bangkok, making it easy to find. The plaza at Terminal 21 is open every day from 10 am until 10 pm.