Jim Thompson House Museum

Extraordinary Heritage

Our fabrics have an extraordinary heritage based on the ideology of one James H. W. Thompson. Jim Thompson was an American architect and art collector born in 1906 and educated at Princeton University. He practiced architecture in New York in the 1930s, and became interested in stage and costume design as a director of the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, an offshoot of the epochal Ballets Russes.

After serving as a military officer in World War II, he settled in Bangkok. Jim Thompson was captivated by Thailand and its culture, particularly the art of hand‑woven Thai silk, with its remarkable range of colours and textures. At that time, however, the craft of silk weaving was in steep decline, threatened by machine‑made fabrics and the advent of synthetic yarns. Yet Jim Thompson believed Thai silk would appeal to textile lovers in America and Europe, whose patronage could support local weavers and silk farmers, in an era when economic opportunities were limited in a developing country such as Thailand.

Jim Thompson dedicated his life to organizing a network of artisans, helping to upgrade their looms, introducing new techniques and designs thereby enabling Thai weavers to create silks that would dazzle the world. By 1950 he had founded The Thai Silk Company, majority‑owned by Thais, aimed in part at sustaining the traditional livelihoods, culture and dignity of local weavers and silk farmers.

Thanks to his decade in New York, Jim Thompson had personal links to the worlds of interior design, fashion, show business, art and media that helped him introduce the new textiles in Europe and America.

Jim Thompson fabrics soon won a devoted following among interior designers, couturiers and creators of costumes for stage and screen. By the 1960s, Thai silk had become world renowned, creating a luxury craft industry that benefited thousands of families, just as Jim Thompson had envisaged.

In 1967 Jim Thompson disappeared mysteriously while vacationing in Malaysia, yet the firm carried on his vision of quality, innovation and benefits to society, growing from 100 employees at that time to more than 1,300 today.aily.

Thai Traditional House

Jim Thompson found this “wonderful” plot of land of one rai, or approximately half an acre, in July 1957. One of the weavers has a lovely old teak house built by his great grand father and wants a new house. Thompson foresees to get the old house and move it across the canal: “I have fun making plans in my spare moments. The land has tremendous trees and all sort of mango trees thrown in. Could have a wonderful garden running down to the canal… All on the second story. It would be lovely to have a place for all the paintings and bronzes”, Jim wrote to his sister Elinor.

Traditional Old Teak House

During the first quarter 1958, Thompson will acquire six old teak Houses, from different sources, three coming from Pak Hai in the Ayutthaya region, two found in Bangkok, but the oldest and the most impressive dates from around 1800 and was a weaver’s house from the Cham village of Bahn Krua.

Thompson on the building site. He brought a group of skilled carpenters down from Ayutthaya to reassemble the woodwork on his property. One practical feature of the Thai house is the ease with which it can be assembled or taken down. The entire house is built in light, pre-fabricated sections with each section forming a wall. Each wall is then fitted together and hung on a frame of wooden pillars without nails. In former times, the fact that the house could be taken down, stacked on a raft and floated down the nearest canal to a new location was well-suited to the indigenous way of life

According to traditional Thai belief, the spirit house provides a home for the resident spirits of the compound. If the spirits are offended, bad luck and misfortune befall the owner and residents of the house. To appease and pacify the spirits, a daily offering of incense sticks, fresh flowers and food is presented. The location of the spirit house is of primary importance. It is never placed in a location where the shadow of the main building casts a shadow over it.

Fashion And Fabrics

In a world where fashion and fabrics are the language of self-expression, a ground-breaking transformation is underway. Multiple brands, once independent and distinct, have come together under a single company group from “JIM THOMPSON” with a remarkable mission – to celebrate the extraordinary diversity of fabric. Each piece that is created tells a story of unity in diversity, reflecting the beauty of individuality and collective strength.

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