The Klaeng monastery named for King Taksin's throne, which keeps a Buddha image built on a woven rattan frame and an ordination hall of Chinese and Western detail.
วัดราชบัลลังก์ประดิษฐาราม · Wat Ratchaballang Praditsaram
By the BAANLYY Editorial Team · Last checked 8 October 2026
| Official name | วัดราชบัลลังก์ประดิษฐาราม — Wat Ratchaballang Praditsaram |
|---|---|
| Where | Thang Kwian, Klaeng, Rayong |
| Royal temple class | Not established from an official register. |
| Monastic order | Not recorded in any register we could read. |
| Ancient monument | Registered national ancient monument Royal Gazette vol. 117, special part 103 ng, 6 October B.E. 2543 The register gives the protected area as 4 rai 81 square wa. The scan the department attaches is page 2 of that part, whose list stops at item 5 in Samut Songkhram, so the monastery's own entry was not read. The page carries a discrepancy of its own: the instrument's heading announces registration and the determination of land boundaries, while its operative sentence announces registration alone. |
| Coordinates | 12.735549, 101.679402 Fine Arts Department national ancient monument register (GIS), monument 0000810; checked against the Thang Kwian, Klaeng address stated in the same record |
Thai temple histories mix two different kinds of statement, and this guide keeps them apart. What a register, a gazette entry, an inscription or a dated royal act shows is one thing. What the chronicles and the temple itself hold is another, and it is worth telling as what it is.
The same account holds that after his coronation the king sent his throne, a lacquer-and-gilt cabinet and a rattan-framed plastered Buddha image to the monastery, and that the present name honoring him was given in the reign of Rama IV. No instrument consulted in this run documents the gift or the renaming.
Rayong's Taksin story has two halves. The town end of it is at Wat Lum. The other end is out at Ban Thale Noi in Klaeng district, an hour east along the coast road, where a monastery carries the king's throne in its name. The Fine Arts Department register says the place began as Wat Noen Sa — hillock and pond, which is exactly the ground it stands on — and became Wat Thale Noi after the village. The account the register carries holds that the king's men camped here in B.E. 2310, that after his coronation he had his throne sent to the monastery along with a lacquer-and-gilt cabinet and a Buddha image, and that in the reign of Rama IV the name was changed to Wat Ratchaballang Praditsaram in his honor. The tourism authority still lists an annual King Taksin commemoration held here.
The image is the reason to make the drive. It is built on a woven rattan armature finished in plaster and gilded — a technique used where an image had to be light enough to move, and almost never what a visitor expects to find under the gold. The register lists it among the objects it describes as royal gifts, together with the lacquer-and-gilt cabinet and the footstool from the throne. None of the three carries an instrument proving the attribution, and this page does not supply one.
The old ordination hall is worth as long a look. Masonry, with a stepped timber roof in diamond tile and a pik nok sweeping over the front and sides; carved timber lamyong and fretwork eaves boards; a plain vertically boarded gable. Two doors at the front, their surrounds in raised line moldings, with arched hoods of painted stucco foliage in the bai thet manner — Chinese and Western ornament mixed, which is how the eastern seaboard built in the second half of the nineteenth century. Pilasters divide the side walls into five bays. The first and last window hoods are triangular, and at the center of each sits a flower and a Chinese ee-pae coin. The department puts the hall at the reigns of Rama IV to Rama V on those grounds, and says so as an inference rather than a date.
The condition is the hard part, and it belongs on the page. The register's statement of present condition for this monument reads that the old ordination hall and the chedi are in very poor repair. The chedi — bell-form, masonry, on a terrace with a stair — was begun in B.E. 2430 and finished in B.E. 2445 according to the register, and its original finial collapsed and was rebuilt as a square harmika carrying a ringed spire. Anyone planning the trip should expect a monument under strain rather than a restored showpiece.
The Buddha image built on a woven rattan frame, plastered and gilded, which the register lists among the objects held to have come from King Taksin, together with a lacquer-and-gilt cabinet and the footstool of his throne.
The old ordination hall: masonry, stepped timber roof in diamond tile with a pik nok over the front and sides, carved timber lamyong, fretwork eaves boards and a plain vertically boarded gable.
Its two front doorways with arched hoods of painted stucco foliage in the bai thet manner, mixing Chinese and Western ornament, and the triangular window hoods at either end of each side wall, each centered on a flower and a Chinese ee-pae coin.
The bell-form chedi, which the register dates to a campaign begun in B.E. 2430 and finished in B.E. 2445, standing on a circumambulation base with a stair, its lost finial rebuilt as a square harmika.
The condition itself: the department's own statement of present condition records both the old hall and the chedi as very badly deteriorated, which is visible before anything else is.
This is a working place of worship for millions of people rather than an attraction, and it is treated as one at the gate. Where a figure below is blank, no source we are prepared to cite states it.
| Hours | Not established from an official source. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Not established from an official source. |
| Dress | A working monastery. Cover shoulders and knees and take shoes off inside. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | At Ban Thale Noi in Tambon Thang Kwian, Klaeng district, east of Rayong town along the coast road. The tourism authority lists an annual King Taksin commemoration held on the monastery grounds. |
Every temple reference repeats claims nobody has checked. These are the ones we went looking for and could not stand up, listed so you know exactly where this page stops.
The name means the royal throne. The account the Fine Arts Department register carries holds that King Taksin sent his throne here after his coronation and that the monastery was renamed in his honor in the reign of Rama IV.
It is built on a woven rattan armature finished in plaster and gilded, rather than cast or carved, and the register lists it among the objects held to have come from King Taksin.
The register dates its building to a campaign begun in B.E. 2430 and completed in B.E. 2445. Its original finial collapsed and was rebuilt as a square harmika.
The department's own statement of present condition records the old ordination hall and the chedi as very badly deteriorated. Expect a monument under strain.
At Ban Thale Noi in Tambon Thang Kwian, Klaeng district, east of Rayong town.
Before you go, read the guide to Buddhism and temple etiquette in Thailand — dress, footwear, where photography is not welcome and how to behave around monks. The rest of Rayong’s temples are covered here too.
Every temple here sits in a place worth reading about on its own terms. The nationwide temple guide covers the other provinces to the same documentary standard as this page, and says on each one what the record establishes and what it does not.
If you are thinking about more than a visit: work out which Thai visa route fits your situation, and see what is available to rent and buy in residences across Thailand.
Last checked 8 October 2026
Every fact on this page is drawn from the sources above. Where they disagree, this page says so rather than choosing silently. Registrations, fees, hours and access change; confirm anything you are relying on with the authority concerned. BAANLYY LLC is a Nevada company and a listing portal, does not represent any temple, and offers no legal or religious advice.