Abdali Mall

Abdali Mall sits at the centre of Amman's new downtown, and the scale of it registers before anything else. The building covers 227,000 square metres across five floors above ground. Five more floors below hold parking for 2,400 cars.

It was designed with open-air features, so air moves through it naturally and sunlight reaches the retail floors. That is an unusual choice in a region where malls are normally sealed and chilled. The mall describes itself as the first of its kind in the Kingdom to use eco-friendly technologies at this scale, with attention paid to building materials and to reducing water and energy consumption.

What fills it is broad rather than specialist. International brands take the upper floors, with local names among them. Cafes and restaurants run alongside, and the food court seats up to a thousand people.

Cinema screens and family entertainment centres take a large share of the floorplan, which makes a visit here an afternoon rather than an errand. The shops themselves are the familiar international roster rather than the reason to make the trip.