English
The Cevahir Shopping Centre in Istanbul is the largest one in Europe. The constructed area is nearly 108 acres and currently there are 343 shops, spread over 6 floors. And don’t think that shopping is all it has to offer. There are also 48 restaurants, a cinema complex and a covered theme park called Atlantis. Pretty amazing huh? It’s ranked as the 6th largest shopping centre in the world.
The number one is occupied by the South China Mall. In theory. Besides fancy decorations such as a 25 meter high replica of the Arc the Triumph and a 2km long Venetian canal with gondolas, it also has space for 2350 shops. Again, in theory. Because 5 years after its grand opening, more than 99% of the space is still empty. The few employees they have are sleeping their way through the day. It is basically a desolate piece of concrete.
The second biggest is again a Chinese mall, the Beijing Golden resources. Although this one actually has stores, it’s far from the centre and it doesn’t attract many customers. Number 3 is the Mall of Asia (Philippines). But what really made us go wild is the Dubai Mall in the United Arab Emirates. With 1200 shops it will be hard to stick to just window shopping. For a strong Turkish coffee you can stop by one of the 38 bars and coffee shops, and even if you are a picky eater I’m sure you’ll find something you like in one of the 82 restaurants.
And if you still have energy after all of that, you could grab a movie in the cinema with 22 screens. There is an aquarium and an underwater zoo, an organic food market, a Sega theme park, an ice rink and huge children’s playground. Oh, and did we mention the part called ‘The Grove’? Within a few minutes the roof can be retracted or closed, so depending on the weather you’ll be shopping inside or outside.
Soon there another attraction will be added to the Dubai Mall: Candylicious, the world’s largest candy store! The surface will cover 940 square meters, and feature chocolate trees with leaves of candy, just like in Charlie and the chocolate factory. Just the idea of all those colorful lollipops and cakes and tons chocolate makes me so hungry I want to eat my keyboard.
But Dubai is expensive, so we prefer to go to Istanbul for a few days and save our money for shopping. After all, Cevahir also has bowling and even a roller coaster. About 190,000 people visit it daily, and a direct metro line makes it easy for tourists to get there. So what are you waiting for? Rent the best apartments in Istanbul and get ready for a shopping spree at the Cevahir Mall in Istanbul!
