After 20-month makeover, Coex open for business

Coex Mall in Samseong-dong, southern Seoul, reopens today with 300 businesses and more space. [NEWS1]

Coex Mall reopens today after 20 months of renovation as a destination for shopping, cultural events and family leisure activities.

The mall is home to 300 retail businesses, including 90 restaurants, on 154,000 square meters (about 1.65 million square feet) of space below the ground floor, which is 22,000 square meters larger than before the renovation. It is the world’s largest single-floor mall.

Foreign brands such as Burberry Beauty Box, Zara Home, Versace Jean and art brand YellowKorner chose the new Coex Mall for their first Korean stores.

Coex Mall also specializes in experience-based stores, such as A Shop for Apple products, Samsung d’light, Kakao Friends Shop and Lounge P, featuring Pororo merchandise.

In addition to the retail area, the extended mall contains performance and convention halls where Coex hopes to hold at least 1,000 cultural events a year.

Park Moon-su, head of the preparatory department for the new Coex Mall, said the reopening will create synergy with Lotte World Mall, located just two subway stations away.

“The renovated Coex Mall makes a large commercial area between Jamsil and Samseong stations, especially for foreign tourists,” said Park. “We hope to provide them with not just shopping, but also tourism and business affairs.

“The new Coex Mall is not so different from Lotte World Mall in terms of products and brand composition, but I’m sure it provides a different shopping experience because all 300 retailers are spread on a single basement floor, unlike the Jamsil mall that consists of six floors.”

Coex Mall, which is owned by the Korea International Trade Association, also offers trade support centers that provide the mall’s affiliated retailers with consultations and arrange meetings with foreign buyers.

BY KIM JI-YOON [jiyoon.kim@joongang.co.kr]