Shopping Centre shopping in Asia
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A
Mahboonkrong (Mbk)
This unbelievably immense shopping mall is quickly becoming one of Bangkok’s top attractions. Half of the city filters through the glass doors on weekends, stutter-stepping on the escalators, stuffing themselves with junk food or making stabs at individualism by accessorising their mundane school uniforms with high slits or torturous heels. You can buy everything you need here: mobile phones, accessories, shoes, name brands, wallets, handbags, T-shirts. The middle-class Tokyu department store also sells good-quality kitchenware.
The 4th floor resembles something of a digital produce market. A confusing maze of stalls sell all the components to send you into the land of…
reviewed
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B
Siam Paragon
Paragon epitomises the city’s fanaticism for the new, the excessive, and absurd slogans. The ‘peerless’ venue is the second-largest mall in Southeast Asia, sprawling over 500,000 sq metres, and is a showcase for luxury retailers, like Van Cleef & Arpels and Mikimoto, who had not previously had a pedestal in the country. There’s a Lamborghini dealer on the 2nd floor should you need a ride home, and one floor up a True Urban Park ‘lifestyle centre’ featuring a cafe, internet access and a shop selling books, music and camera equipment. Bookworms will fancy Kinokuniya (3rd floor), the largest bookstore in Thailand, as well as an expansive branch of Asia Books (2nd…
reviewed
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C
Central World Plaza
Spanning eight storeys of more than 500 shops and 100 restaurants, Central World is one of Southeast Asia’s largest shopping centres. But it suffered a huge setback in May 2010 when its centrepiece Zen department store was torched by fleeing protesters. Other parts of the complex were largely unaffected, and in 2012, the Zen department store was finally reopened.
reviewed
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D
Gaysorn Plaza
A haute couture catwalk, Gaysorn has spiralling staircases, all-white halls and mouthfuls of top-name designers. The 2nd-floor ‘Thai Fashion Chic’ zone is a crash course in Bangkok's local fashion industry. Relatively well-established Thai labels including Kai, GGUB and Stretsis are represented, or you could head over to Myth, an umbrella store for emerging domestic brands.
Stores on the 3rd floor offer the same level of sophistication for your home. Thann Native sells locally inspired soaps and shampoos fragrant enough to eat. Lamont carries elegant ceramics, and Almeta, Thai silk. The open-air D&O Shop is the first retail venture of an organisation created to…
reviewed
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E
Daikanyama Address
Just northwest of Daikanyama Station, this small retail complex is notable for its clever suspension bridges and four dozen or so designer boutiques selling clothing, eyewear and other sartorially stylish accessories. The open-air plaza is a treat on quiet afternoons, and weekends tend to be relatively free of mad throngs of shoppers.
reviewed
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F
Shin-Puh-Kan
This new Downtown shopping complex has a variety of boutiques and restaurants clustered around a huge open-air atrium. The offerings here run to the trendy and ephemeral, which seems to appeal to all the young folk who congregate here. Occasional art and music performances are held in the atrium.
reviewed
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G
Greenhills Shopping Center
Greenhills Shopping Center is somewhat like a flea market, with stall after stall selling DVDs and brand-named clothing of questionable legitimacy. But snoop around and you’ll find quality antiques and the best selection of genuine pearls in the country.
reviewed
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H
Grandview Shopping Mall
Those with modern tastes might want to head to the Tianhe area, with its fashionable shopping plazas. Grandview Shopping Mall - the largest in Asia - is Guǎngzhōu's newest shopping mall.
reviewed
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100ft
An appealing boutique for colourful clothes, interior design and handicrafts; it also has a restaurant and bar.
reviewed
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I
Tokyo Midtown
Like Roppongi Hills, Tokyo Midtown is a composite urban district of ultramodern buildings surrounding a historic Japanese garden. Following the same design and urban planning lines that made Roppongi Hills so successful, the Tokyo Midtown complex brims with sophisticated bars, restaurants, shops, art galleries, a hotel and leafy public spaces. Escalators ascend alongside man-made waterfalls of rock and glass, bridges in the air are lined with back-lit washi (Japanese handmade paper), and planters full of soaring bamboo draw your eyes through skylights to the lofty heights of the towers above. Separate from the myriad opportunities for parting with serious cash is …
reviewed
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J
Siam Square
Siam Square is ground zero for teenage culture in Bangkok. Pop music blares out of tinny speakers, and gangs of hipsters in various costumes ricochet between fast-food restaurants and closet-sized boutiques. Digital Gateway stocks everything electronic, from computers to cameras. DJ Siam carries all the Thai indie and T-pop albums you’ll need to speak ‘teen’. Small shops peddle pop-hip styles along Soi 2 and Soi 3, but most outfits require a barely there waist.
reviewed
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K
Central Chidlom
Central is a modern Western-style department store with locations throughout the city. This flagship store, Thailand’s largest, is the snazziest of all the branches.
reviewed
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L
Robinsons Place
Shopping malls at times seem to have eaten Manila. Many are thronged on weekends as residents escape their jammed and steamy abodes for a walk through the air-con comfort. You can find a range of department stores such as Shoe Mart at most, and, depending on the neighbourhood, the selection of stores can be startlingly upscale. Most include a supermarket and food court.
Ermita and Malate are served by Robinsons Place. It's a vast place and it's getting bigger. Is this glitzy change from the broken pavements of Ermita good or bad? And does this point to a Makati-like future for the area? The hordes inside have voted with their feet.
reviewed
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M
Seomun Market
Daegu is a shopper's dream. In addition to good prices on all kinds of 'normal' and brand-name goods (clothes, shoes, bags etc) at the various department stores, Daegu has numerous speciality markets that make for a fascinating stroll even if you're not going to part with any won. Start at the Seomun Market, a hulking, multistorey complex with over 4000 shops in six sections. Bustling yet orderly, it's been one of Korea's big-three markets since opening in 1669, even if the current buildings have little of that historic character. The market is closed on the second and fourth Sunday of each month.
reviewed
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N
Promenade Arcade
A low-key but noteworthy stop, Promenade Arcade shelters several of Bangkok’s influential décor designers. On the 2nd floor, Gub features the creations of ML Chiratorn Chirapravati and Kongpat Sakdapitak; the pair, along with other like-minded designers, have created a bright, irreverent world of lamps, chandeliers and paintings, and their showroom is like a thrift store on acid. Sakul Intakul, the acclaimed floral designer, displays his flower vessels (that’s a ‘vase’, kiddo) that bring couture to home arrangements.
reviewed
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O
Jeans Street
Advertising is one thing, but a 20ft-high plaster statue of Rambo? Bandung's celebrated 'Jeans' Street, Jl Cihampelas, is the place where seeing is believing. Traditionally the home of the city's thriving textile industry, this congested drag, in the affluent northern suburbs of Bandung, is now a menagerie of kitsch plaster giants, looming over shops competing with one another for the top spot in the city's booming denim trade.
The jeans are definitely cheap; just don't expect to look like a Dean or a Monroe when you slip them on.
reviewed
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P
Emporium
You might not have access to the beautiful people’s nightlife scene, but you can observe their spending rituals at this temple to red-hot-and-classic cool. For something cheekily local, check out Propaganda, home to Mr P (brainchild of Thai designer Chaiyut Plypetch), who appears in anatomically correct cartoon lamps and other products.
reviewed
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Q
Pantip Plaza
If you can tolerate the crowds and annoying pornography vendors (‘DVD sex? DVD sex?’), Pantip, a multistorey computer and electronics warehouse, might just be your kinda paradise. Technorati will find pirated software and music, gear for hobbyists to enhance their machines, flea market–style peripherals and other odds and ends. Up on the 5th floor is IT City, a reliable computer megastore that can provide VAT Refund forms for tourists.
reviewed
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R
Marikina Shoe Expo
Easily the oddest collection of stores in Manila is at the Marikina Shoe Expo, a once open-air collection of discount shoe vendors. Some of the shops in this old single-level complex remain (with inventory unchanged since Imelda was in her prime), but now some of the storefronts have been taken over by an uber-hip assortment of kitschy shops and galleries who have discovered the cheap rent. There's a gallery, Blacksoup Project Artspace, a bookshop, Datelines Bookstore and a funky Italian café, Bellini's.
reviewed
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S
77th Street
Descend the stairs into this unique underground mall and see where ordinary teen and 20-something Beijingers go for their clothes and accessories. It opens out into a huge, circular, three-storey collection of hundreds of stores. As well as funky T-shirts, belts and bags, there are shoe shops galore and a food court. It’s lots of fun, but a madhouse at weekends. To get there walk north on Xidan Beidajie from the subway and take the first right, then look for the 77th Street sign.
reviewed
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T
Sogo
Sogo is one of Běijīng’s most pleasant mall experiences. The mix of hip Japanese (Sogo is a Japanese company) and European boutiques, the convenient layout and an excellent, cheap food court on the 6th floor makes Sogo more fun than you’d expect a shopping centre to be. Add espresso bars on each floor, the impressive basement supermarket (with pharmacy) and the 6th-floor games arcade, where you can deposit kids while shopping, and you’re in mall heaven.
reviewed
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Ortigas Center
Mall fans with Brobdingnagian fantasies should head east to Ortigas Center, which sits on the border of Quezon City, Mandaluyong and Pasig. With its dense concentration of shopping malls and high-rises, Ortigas Center has become Manila's second-biggest business and commercial hub. However, it's still got a lot of work to do to find its soul.
Here there are no less than four malls: Shangri-La Plaza Mall, Robinsons Galleria, The Podium and the the biggest one of all, SM Megamall.
reviewed
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U
Erawan Bangkok
Bangkok’s chichi crowd has a new stomping ground: the shopping wing of the Erawan Hotel. Luxury matrons occupy the 1st floor, while street-smarts chill on the 2nd floor, fusing the generation gap with a shared closet. The top floor is a dedicated wellness centre, should conspicuous consumption prove hazardous to your health. The ladies who lunch can often be found in the basement-level Urban Kitchen or the 2nd-floor Erawan Tea Room.
reviewed
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Mydin's Wholesale Emporium
Mydin's Wholesale Emporium is part of a nationwide chain that sells everything from toothpaste to watches and DVDs at rock-bottom, no-need-to-bargain prices. Penang is a fun place to shop with plenty of outlets for local crafts and antiques, as well as cameras and electronics at competitive prices (although Kuala Lumpur has a wider range). Bargaining is usually required, except in department stores like this. Jln Penang is the best shopping street in Georgetown.
reviewed
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Shopping Centres
In Minato Mirai, Yokohama World Porters is a huge shopping complex with lots of restaurants on the ground floor including Vivre, possibly the world's cleanest supermarket. Landmark Tower and Queens Square are similarly filled with shopping and dining, and Akarenga Sōkō with craft, antique and specialty shops. There are often street performances throughout Minato Mirai. The more intimate shopping strip of Motomachi is lined with lovely boutiques.
reviewed