Middle eastern promise

Retail building in the Middle East

Retail in the Middle East is currently experiencing an unprecedented level of growth thanks to the region’s booming economies. At Mott MacDonald we’re taking part in the creation of this lucrative new industry in which the transition of the local players from high-street shops to custom-designed complexes offers huge opportunities for associated commercial, residential and leisure developments.

Mall of the EmiratesDubia's newly opened Mall of Emirates, incorporating the first indoor ski slopes in the Middle East, is among the projects we’ve helped realise. Strategic-ally located in the heart of what is now deemed ‘New Dubai’, this 223,000m2 centre developed by the Majid Al Futtaim Group offers a range of shopping, leisure and entertainment facilities. Our role was as structural engineer for the main mall, car park and 5-star hotel, a task that presented a number of challenges.

To achieve the fast track con-struction programme the project team had to come up with a variety of value engineering ideas during the design stage. One innovative approach saw us adopting mass concrete foundations compared to traditional piled foundations, combining basic design principles with imagination and lower cost, locally available raw materials to save time and money.

Housed in the gigantic development is Dubai’s first Harvey Nichols, described in the press as ‘by far the finest store in Dubai’. Mott MacDonald provided catwalks for the prestigious outlet, as well as designing the mezzanines – the requirements for which meant that the floors were just 300mm thick. We’ve also helped relocate the 24,500m2 Ikea, the UAE’s largest retail outlet now boasting parking for 1200 vehicles, a 300-seat restaurant and a first-of-its-kind Swedish foodmarket.

The current boom has also seen us appointed lead consultant and engineer by Majid Al Futtaim for the £200 million Bahrain city centre mall. Alongside the 207,000m2 of retail space, hotels, and 20 screen cinema, the mall will be home to the largest indoor climate controlled water park in the Middle East. We are also currently engaged in the design of a £50 million extension to Deira City Centre in Dubai, featuring 11 cinemas, four restaurants and two car showrooms with ten floors of office space. Among the shops will be Bin Hendi Avenue, a stunning two storey avenue concept store for which we designed the dramatic lighting.

These large scale centres are bringing many benefits for their surrounding communities. “The Mall of the Emirates has had a huge impact, which is typical of such projects,” says Graeme Proctor from our Dubai office. “There’s been a huge surge in buildings such as apartments around the outside of the mall. It just keeps creating more opportunities which feed back into the local community.”