Dipti Nair
Doha
The much-awaited Doha Festival City, which is poised to be the biggest mall in Qatar and is one of the largest leisure and retail developments in the Gulf, is all set to open doors on April 5.
"We are very excited with the opening of Doha Festival City on April 5. On the day, majority of the mall with over 200 stores and many food outlets will start operations. There will be celebrations all through the year. Each phase will bring in more celebrations and excitement for the consumers as they will want to keep coming back to the mall to see what is new. We hope to be entirely operational by the end of this year," Doha Festival City General Manager Trevor Hill said.
Located at Umm Salal Muhammed, the mall will have around 500 retail stores and 100 dining outlets. The mall will also have a number of new brands and concepts including the largest Monoprix Hypermarket in the world, Qatar's first and only Harvey Nichols department store and the first ACE Hardware in Qatar.
Doha Festival City has 45,000 sqm of leisure space that will include a state-of-the-art indoor and outdoor entertainment zone, including four innovative theme parks Angry Birds World, Snow Dunes, Juniverse and Virtuosity. It will also bring to Qatar for the first time, customer-focused cinema exhibitor, VOX Cinemas, which will bring the 4DX concept to Qatar along with VOX Kids.
Visitors will have free access to an Outdoor Leisure Trail, which includes a running and walking path, as well as an adjacent cycling lane with technical trail features specifically designed for mountain bikes.
The mall also offers 8,000 parking spaces and the biggest park assist project in Qatar, that will, through red and green lights, direct visitors to empty spaces.
The system will also be connected to a control desk and customer service area to help customers find their cars.
The Festival City development broke ground in 2011 with the construction of Ikea, which has been successfully operating since March 2013.