Wat Sri Suphan

Not to be confused with the ‘White Temple’ in Chiang Rai (Wat Rong Khun), Wat Sri Suphan off of Chiang Mai’s Wualai Road (the same road that sees the Saturday Walking Street every week) is a shiny spectacle in its own right. The neighbourhood was historically home to the city’s silver craftsmen (in fact you can still find many silver stores and workshops here today) and to celebrate the area’s history and skilled artisans, the temple’s special ubosot (meaning ‘shrine’ in Thai) is completely covered with intricate hand-hammered silver designs. While the coverings for the holy images are made out of actual silver, the rest are mainly made from alloy and zinc. The ongoing community project to create ‘The World’s First Silver Shrine’ started in 2004 and is still in progress. You can see the artists tapping designs into the metal daily on the temple grounds. The silver ubosot is clearly Wat Sri Suphan’s primary draw, there’s nothing like it anywhere else. The temple’s main building, known as a viharn, is also worth a visit as it features unique wall paintings. Surprisingly, many tourists don’t seem to know about Wat Sri Supha; there aren’t any tour buses stopping here (yet) and the temple still retains a very strong neighbourhood feel.

Location: 100 Wualai Road.