Just stayed at the Art Mai Gallery Hotel Chiang Mai for a few nights while on business in Chiang Mai. This is a trendy little Artsy hotel located in Nimman area, which is full of hip little cafes, art shops, cafes and restaurants, about 5 minutes from Maya Lifestyle Mall and 15-20 minutes from the Chiang Mai Airport.
Check in is fast and easy and the hotel obviously has a strong art theme with paintings and art in the lobby and rooms. The rooms aren’t huge, but plenty big enough for a couple. Beds are ok, not super comfy but absolutely fine for this price and you won’t be complaining. Bathroom is a good size, shower was okay first night but in the morning there didn’t seem to be much cold water so the shower was too hot no matter which way you turned it.
There’s a fancy little restaurant with a good selection of food but in the afternoon it was full of mosquitoes. The room also had mosquitoes that I could hear buzzing around but somehow managed to avoid being bitten. We sat in the restaurant for a few hours and despite seeing many of them, also managed to avoid being bitten for the most part. Prices are a bit steep but that’s pretty typical of most hotels in Thailand and not really anything against Art Mai Gallery Hotel Chiang Mai.
The hotel is in Nimman Soi 3, and in Soi 1, there’s a trendy shopping mall with local designer shops so if you’re into that type of thing you’ll love this area. The main road is quite busy and doesn’t have that many shops but if you down Soi 1, 3 and 5 they’re all scattered with nice, mostly new shops including cafes, restaurants and the like. It’s about a 1 minute walk to One Nimman, a cool little mall scattered with some artys craftsy shops, restaurants, and cafes.
Breakfast was ok but this area, as with the whole of Chiang Mai, seems to have a lot of mainland Chinese. Not too loud with the exception of one loud eater who thought he was absolutely shit hot eating with his mouth open and making the loudest chewing noises know to man,. Honestly, you really have to make an effort to be chewing that loudly. You could see the staff rolling their eyelids and in general the Thai’s are not that fond of the Mainland Chinese.
Anyway, choose your eggs (scrambled, fried, omelette or boiled) and there’s the usual selection that you find at any decent hotel in SE Asia. Some rather processed looking sausages, ok toast and some Asian stuff. Unless you’re a huge breakfast connoisseur and demanding that you have the absolute best breakfast ever, the breakfast at Art Mai Gallery Hotel is totally fine.
Staff were friendly and nice as can be expected at pretty much any hotel you stay at in Thailand. There’s a 7-Eleven about 5 minutes walk (walk to the main road, turn left and walk about 200m). The Art Mai Gallery Hotel also has two scooters available for free. I’m all for electric scooters but not sure I’d be comfortable riding one around this area. It’d be fine for exploring the back soi’s but you better be careful if going out on to the main road as you’d need to be riding on the road and there’s quite a bit of traffic on the main road.
The Art Mai Gallery Hotel Chiang Mai is quiet, it’s at the end of the Soi and you don’t hear any traffic or anything else. Overall, I’d definitely come here and stay here again. You can read about more Chiang Mai in our Chiang Mai destination kids here.
For more information about the Art Mai Gallery Hotel Chiang Mai feel free to contact us on our contact page or via Twitter. Few more photos:
