The country’s biggest shopping mall opened only last Sunday, but its owners and developers said the redevelopment of SM North Edsa will surpass the Mall of Asia.

Hans Sy, president of SM Prime Holdings Inc. said that the company wants its first mall to shine.

‘We still have an optimum project at hand. Much bigger than this one,’ says Hans, son of mall mogul Henry Sy.

The North Edsa project is expected to be over by 2008.

‘It will be bigger in actual floor space than the Mall of Asia,’ Sy added.

The older Sy—’Tatang’ to most employees of SMPHI—first came up with the idea of building a supersized shopping enclave 21 years ago with SM North Edsa.

There is still room for expansion at SM North Edsa since the company was able to buy a former military camp site adjacent to the complex.

A new building within the complex will soon be opened.

SM now has 24 malls.

The Mall of Asia is so big that it will take one a little over 3 hours to walk around all the 4 buildings and approximately a day just to browse at each outlet. That’s exactly the reason why there is a 24-seater electric vehicle transporting mallers.

The SM Mall of Asia houses an Olympic-sized skating rink, 600 local and foreign shops, 150 dining establishments, the first IMAX theater in the country with a screen the height of an 8-storey building, a bowling and billiard center, a music hall and a spectacular view of Manila’s famous sunset.

Premiere establishments have chosen to locate their flagship stores into what is billed to be the ultimate in mall experience.

‘We are 90 percent occupied,’ says Annie Garcia, president of SM Supermalls.

Garcia added that there is a very good mix of local and international brands. ‘You’ll find high-end shops like Zara, Lacoste, Guess, or Mango mixed with local brands. The mall really has everything for everyone.’

The SM Mall of Asia measures 400,000 square meters on a 19-hectare property.

Located on a reclaimed area that is now known as the Bay City in Pasay City, the giant project was built at a cost of P6.5 billion and it took two and a half years to build using roughly 3.1 million bags of cement, 31,400 tons of reinforcing steel bars and 6,000 tons of structural steel.

Sy said that they doubled every international building standards, making the mall a safe enclave for everyone.

‘The rumors (of a sinking building) are not true. The building can even withstand winds of up to 400 km/hr,’ Sy said.

The Mall of Asia was designed by Arquitectonica, a US-based designing firm which did, among others, Festival Walk in Hong Kong, American Airlines Arena in Miami for the Miami Heat, Westin Hotel in Times Square, New York and Disney All Star Resort in Florida.

The SM Mall of Asia is envisioned to be ‘the destination mall’ and a ‘mall for celebrations’ in the Philippines, if not in the region.

‘We have here a major transportation depot that can take shoppers in and out of the area,’ Garcia added. There are even plans of opening the depot to bus operators from Lucena and Laguna.

But even with its massive scale, Mall of Asia is only the first phase in a masterplanned development that combines residential, commercial and retail establishments in one contiguous area—the SM Central Business Park.

The SM CBP will be the most significant business district in Metro Manila. This ideal mix of shopping, dining, leisure and entertainment that is the signature of SM Supermalls will be complemented by other components of this mixed-use facility.

Adjacent multi-function spaces such as the Maitrade Convention and Expo Center—the country’s first privately-owned and operated convention and exhibition center with retail shops along its perimeter; and One-E-Com Center—a ten-storey, fully-wired building specially designed for call center and other business process outsourcing companies, will soon rise at the SM Central Business Park, developed by SM Investments Corp.

Other developments in the masterplan includes hotels, office and residential clusters, a coliseum for sporting events and entertainment shows as well as a ferry terminal.