The largest shopping centre in Laos yesterday broke ground on the next stage of its expansion.
Talat Sao Shopping Mall, located in Chanthabouly district, Vientiane , will soon include a separate eight-storey building with 12,000 rooms over 65,000 square metres.
It will feature a shopping complex, department stores, supermarket, fast food outlets, restaurants, a cinema, karaoke lounge, function halls, a training school, small office-home office apartments, a hotel and parking for 300 more cars.
Talat Sao Shopping Mall Marketing Director, Mr Lewis Koo, said the project was worth about 347 billion kip (US$40 million) and scheduled for completion in November next year.
The mall currently consists of one five-storey building with 200 rooms covering 23,000 square metres. It took two years to build and opened in April 2007, with parking for 280 cars.
The project will be backed by Singaporean investor Crescendas Group. Its CEO, Dr Lawrence Leow, explained the plans for the second phase.
“Our plans will include demolishing and upgrading the retained part of the existing U-shape block surrounding this site and integrating it with the new central phase two building,” he said.
“We propose to keep the key architectural features unique to Laos . This is befitting of a structure that we envisage as a centre for Lao craft, cuisine and cultural activities and a place focused on tourism-related activities.”
When these renovations are complete the investors will start a third stage of development to upgrade the existing morning market and integrate it with the main shopping complex.
Pending government approval, the third stage will cover about 12,000 square metres, mainly catering for cultural activities and tourism promotion. It will also include training schools and a child education centre.
Total investment for all three phases will be about 607 billion kip (US$70 million), according to a company press release.
“When we first decided to embark on the development of Talat Sao Mall, we were confident that our product would be met with enthusiastic response, both from the retailers and shoppers,” Dr Lawrence Leow said.
Talat Sao Shopping Mall President, Mr Tan Meng Liang said this expectation had been met.
“From the feedback that we received from business owners and retailers, we believe that the demand for retail space continues to be very strong,” Mr Tan said.
“To meet this demand, we decided to proceed with the development of the second phase.”
The Deputy Mayor of Vientiane , Mr Bounchanh Sinthavong was enthusiastic about the project.
“The project is to welcome the 25 th SEA Games in December next year in Laos ,” Mr Bounchanh announced at the ground-breaking ceremony.
Mr Bounchanh said investors initially signed an investment agreement with the Lao government in 2004 at a cost of about 234 billion kip (US$27 million). He said investors would own and operate the mall from now until 2049. After this period, ownership of the building will revert to the government.
Set up in 1982, Crescendas Group is engaged in a diverse range of businesses covering real estate, manufacturing, distribution and technology. The group has a presence in Singapore , Malaysia , Vietnam , China and Germany .
i have few questions for those live in Laos or people that visited Laos recently.. how's the new Talard Saow??? all the new units are fill in???? the mall itself real busy and business are doing well???? the foods on the food court are pretty good??
the design of this second step seems to be much better than first one
The current new building have nothing to do with lao architecture and former morning market.
the future building (the one of the photo above) respect the style of the former building, but very very modernised.... i think it's ok... maybe just a little bit too big! it looks so big!!!!
It's good to have a big and modern shooping mall in the center of Vientiane. But how long thie prices can remain affordable as now? is it sure there is no risk to see prices rising and rising, just because the building is more modern? I like to buy thing there because it's very low price.. if prices become too high, it won't be interesting any more!
I have just went to Laos and visit the mall last month,. what i found it that the mall look strange with the car park faceing to the big and main street of the city,. it should be the best location of shop or restaurant so that people can see the street while they are shopping,. but once bad location of it was: faceing to the west which all the sun shine around the day and make it hot so that it could not build shops, the mall closed at 5pm it look strange too,. it should be a peak time from 5 to 8pm for shopping and hangout but it turn different from other mall around the world,. the outside look seem to be modern and new but in fact inside design look not that nice or modern,. and the interior design too look not so nice,. I hope that the next upgrade make it more better and i dont think that just only putting the roof it show lao architect style at all,.
sopheaktr wrote:the mall closed at 5pm it look strange too,. it should be a peak time from 5 to 8pm for shopping and hangout but it turn different from other mall around the world,.
The name of this mall is Talat Sao / Morning market!
5 to 8pm is far from the morning, don't you think?
If it is called Talad Sao,, it should be opened for business from the morning to noon time only not until 5 p.m. ha ha ha. It is better called the central Vientiane market, no morning or evening market or all day market. Just call it the central market.
Its called Talat Sao because in history this area is where the talat sao was for vientiane residents, in trying to keep a lao design and a lao style, i guess they wanted to keep the same name, which is good!
