A Thai street food restaurant called Samyan is moving into the former Nua Thai space at 5410 17th Ave NW in Ballard, becoming the fourth restaurant concept to occupy the address in just six years. A window sign at the location already reads “Bangkok Food Guide,” and liquor license paperwork lists Tippawan Wongkaew as the new owner.
The news comes from My Ballard, which reported that Samyan has no website or social media presence yet, leaving many details about a possible opening date still unknown. Wongkaew previously co-founded Sabaijai Thai in Everett, a restaurant that has built a reputation for authentic Thai home cooking since it opened in April 2022 at 1707 Hewitt Avenue, according to the outlet’s own site. That original location has since drawn recognition from Restaurant Guru in both 2024 and 2025, and Wongkaew went on to expand the brand with a second Sabaijai Thai location in Marysville.
The name Samyan is a direct nod to Bangkok’s Sam Yan neighborhood, the urban street-food district that surrounds Chulalongkorn University and is anchored by a fresh market with roughly four decades of history, per Chulalongkorn University. Sam Yan is known for night food stalls and street-vendor fare rather than the sit-down curry houses many American diners associate with Thai cuisine, and Samyan’s branding suggests it intends to lean into that street-food identity rather than a traditional menu.
A Storefront That Can't Keep a Tenant
Whatever Samyan becomes, it inherits a location with a restless history. Nua Thai opened at the address in December 2024 with dishes like Suki Yaki and Gui Chai Tod, but the restaurant lasted less than two years before vacating the space this year, the site’s report notes. Before that, the space housed Cycle Dogs, a vegan hot dog venue that occupied the storefront for three years before closing on January 31, 2024, after which the business reinvented itself as a mobile food cart parked outside Bickersons Brewhouse on Leary Way NW.
Go back further and the address was home to No Bones Beach Club, Ballard’s first all-vegan tiki bar and restaurant, which operated there for about four years before closing in 2020. That run traces back to a 2016 opening in the former Bloom restaurant space, according to Seattle Met. Hoodline itself once featured the vegan tiki bar as one of the city’s top plant-based dining destinations. All told, the storefront has now cycled through four distinct concepts — No Bones Beach Club, Cycle Dogs, Nua Thai, and now Samyan — in just six years, a pattern that raises real questions about whether the location itself poses a challenge for restaurateurs or whether the turnover is simply coincidence.
Joining Ballard's Thai Food Scene
Samyan won’t be entering an empty market. Ballard’s Thai dining scene is anchored by Thai Siam Restaurant on 15th Ave NW, which opened in 1987 and stands as Seattle’s second-oldest Thai restaurant. Samyan’s street-food framing also echoes a broader shift in Seattle dining toward Bangkok-style market concepts, a trend Hoodline tracked back in 2019 when Belltown’s Bangrak Market opened to showcase street-style skewers, papaya salads, and night-market dishes.
Before Samyan can start pouring drinks, it will need to clear Washington’s liquor licensing process, which requires posting a physical notice of application on the premises for up to 30 days along with a site inspection, according to Toast POS. State liquor applications can typically take 60 to 90 days to process, meaning an opening date is likely still weeks or months away even as the storefront’s signage hints that change is already underway.
