Soi Romanee
Soi Romanee is 133 metres long and runs between Thalang Road and Dibuk Road. You can walk it in two minutes, and it is the one street in Phuket Old Town that everybody photographs.
Nothing on it opens before 08:00. It fills from about 10:00, is at its fullest between 14:00 and 16:00, and by 18:30 most of it has shut.
What the alley was for
Thalang Road had the tin dealers, the hardware suppliers and the herb shops. Soi Romanee had the brothels.
Through the tin century this was where the miners spent what they earned: women, gambling, opium and drink, in a lane one shophouse deep on either side, thirty seconds' walk from the traders' street. The two sat that close together because that was the arrangement.
The name is an old Thai word for pleasure, which reads as either plain speech or a euphemism depending on who you ask.
None of that is visible now. The buildings are the buildings, restored and repainted, and nothing on the alley marks what any of them was.
Walking up from Thalang Road
The first thing you meet is a wall. About 18 metres in on the left is Alex Face's Red Tortoise Mardi, his signature character wearing a costume shaped like an ang ku, the red turtle cake eaten at Por Tor. Next to it is Rukkit'sGeometric Eagle, in the colour blocks of the old Pho Thong wooden buses.
Google gives that wall its own listing, with opening hours of 00:00 to 24:00 and, on Saturdays, its busiest hour at 22:00. People stand in front of it at ten at night.
Past the mural the alley is shops and rooms in roughly equal measure. Batik at number 4. Amritsr at the halfway point. Dou Brew, a guesthouse and a gallery on the west side at number 15. Torry's, the bakery and a boutique hotel opposite at 16. The Dibuk end is homewares, a juice shop and the mango stands.
The three worth stopping for
- Amritsr Old Town4.8 from 8,212 reviews
Punjabi, halfway up on the east side, and the most-reviewed restaurant in Old Town by a distance. It is also the only thing on the alley still serving at 22:00.
09:00–00:00 daily
- Dou Brew Coffee & Craft4.8 from 879 reviews
Number 15, and the only coffee on the alley before 09:00. Opens at 08:00 every day, ฿1–200 (~$0.30–6) a head, and shuts at 18:00 like most of the district.
Mon 08:00–18:00 · Tue 08:00–18:00 · Wed 08:00–18:00 · Thu 08:00–18:00 · Fri 08:00–18:00 · Sat 08:00–19:00 · Sun 08:00–19:00
- Torry's Ice Cream4.4 from 2,914 reviews
The queue you will see from the Thalang end. Coconut, black rice and bee-ko-moi rather than the flavours you can get anywhere, which is what people write about. Weakest rating of these three, and at its busiest between 13:00 and 16:00 every day of the week.
10:00–18:00 daily
And the rest of the doors
- BONNEE - Brunch & Blends4.8 from 421 reviews
Number 28, ฿200–400 a head, open to 20:00 and 20:30 on Sundays. Busiest on Sunday morning, when nothing else on the alley is.
Mon 10:00–20:00 · Tue 10:00–20:00 · Wed 10:00–20:00 · Thu 10:00–20:00 · Fri 10:00–20:00 · Sat 10:00–20:00 · Sun 10:00–20:30
- Old Town Street4.5 from 640 reviews
Homewares and souvenirs at number 30, up towards the Dibuk end. Opens 08:30 and shuts 17:30 six days a week, and 09:00 to 18:00 on Sundays.
Mon 08:30–17:30 · Tue 08:30–17:30 · Wed 08:30–17:30 · Thu 08:30–17:30 · Fri 08:30–17:30 · Sat 08:30–17:30 · Sun 09:00–18:00
- Batik Banyan Phuket4.7 from 22 reviews
Batik at number 4, a few steps in from Thalang Road. Closed on Wednesdays, and its opening time moves between 09:00 and 11:00 depending on the day.
Mon 11:00–18:00 · Tue 09:00–17:00 · Wed closed · Thu 11:00–18:00 · Fri 11:00–18:00 · Sat 11:00–18:00 · Sun 10:00–20:00
- Soi Romanee4.6 from 154 reviews
A bakery at number 16 that took the street as its name, 09:00–19:00 daily, ฿200–400 a head. Google has it filed under the street, so searches for the alley land on the shop.
09:00–19:00 daily
Four separate places inside 133 metres sell mango smoothies. A kiosk and a juice shop at the Dibuk end, both of which sell little else, plus one of the restaurants and the corner shop next door to it. They are fine. They are also the clearest signal you will get that the alley now sells what photographs well.
The murals arrived as an argument
Phuket was named a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy in December 2015, and the art followed the title rather than the other way round. A house owner on Dibuk Road invited local artists to paint the outside wall, the foot traffic that produced led to a collective called So Phuket, and by the middle of 2016 that group had launched F.A.T. Phuket with twelve artists and twelve commissioned murals.
One of them lasted a month. Residents and building owners on Dibuk Road objected to a mural on a historic façade, and on 9 May 2016 So Phuket had the artist paint the work out again.
Taste was not the whole of the objection. Conservationists argue that modern acrylic and aerosol paint does not breathe, so it seals water inside soft lime plaster and the stucco starts coming away. After May 2016 the commissions moved onto side walls, alley walls and buildings with no heritage listing, which is a large part of why the art you photograph here is in the alleys rather than on the main streets.
The busiest kitchen on the alley is Punjabi
Amritsr has more reviews than any other restaurant in Phuket Old Town, and four times as many as every museum in the district put together. It serves amritsari kulcha, chole bhature, dal makhani and pani puri, in the lane that used to be the red-light district, and it is open from 09:00 to midnight every day.
The reason is the timetable. The old Phuket kitchens here trade at breakfast and lunch and are shut by 18:00 or 20:00; the evening was standing empty, and the restaurants that arrived to take it are Indian, Turkish and Mexican.
When to go
Before 09:00 the alley is yours and everything in it is closed. That is the trade. Dou Brew at 08:00 is the only exception, and a coffee at number 15 is the one way to be on the street early without standing about.
From 14:00 to 16:00 every shop on the alley is at or near its own busiest hour, and the street is five metres wide. You will be walking through other people's photographs, and they will be walking through yours.
Sunday evening is a different street. Thalang Road closes to traffic at 16:00 and the night market runs right up to the mouth of the alley, which pushes the crowd into it until late. Come on a Sunday for that deliberately or avoid the whole district after 17:00.
Check Wednesdays before you plan around any single shop: the batik place at number 4 is shut, and the cafés move their hours about more than they publish.
Sleeping on it
Four places on the alley rent rooms: a bed and breakfast and a guesthouse at number 15, a two-room boutique house at 16, and a small hotel at 29. None of them publishes a rate worth printing, because a night here in August and a night here in January are two different prices.
What you are paying for is the hour before nine, when the alley is empty and everyone photographing it is still in bed somewhere else.
You are being counted
Thalang Road and Soi Romanee are the two corridors where the municipality has put AI-classifying cameras on the pedestrian traffic, sorting what passes into people, cars, motorcycles, vans and tuk-tuks. The lane people come to photograph is also one of the two the municipality photographs back.
How long is Soi Romanee?
133 metres, running between Thalang Road and Dibuk Road. Two minutes end to end at a walk, and about five if anyone in your party has a camera.
What time should I go to Soi Romanee?
Before 09:00 if you want the street itself, because almost nothing is open and almost nobody is there. Dou Brew at number 15 opens at 08:00 and is the only coffee. The alley is at its fullest between 14:00 and 16:00, and by 18:30 most of it has shut.
Why is it called Soi Romanee?
It was the red-light lane for the tin miners, and the name is an old Thai word for pleasure. The brothels, gambling houses and opium dens are long gone; the buildings they were in are the ones people now photograph.
Is Soi Romanee worth going to?
For ten minutes, yes, and it is free. It is one short alley of restored shophouse fronts with ice cream, coffee, batik and four places selling mango smoothies, so treat it as something you walk through on the way to Dibuk Road rather than a destination in itself.
Amritsr is at the halfway point of the alley on the east side, Dou Brew at number 15, and Torry's at 16. After 22:00, Amritsr is the only door on the street still open.