Festival Walk

Festival Walk

Exterior view of Festival Walk
Location	Tat Chee Avenue, Yau Yat Chuen, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong
Opening date	November 1998
Developer	Swire Properties, CITIC Pacific
Owner	Mapletree Greater China Commercial Trust
Architect	Arquitectonica
No. of stores and services	220
Total retail floor area	over 980,000 sq ft (91,000 m2)
No. of floors	7 floors
Parking	830 spaces
Public transit access	Kowloon Tong Station
Website	Festivalwalk.com

Festival Walk is a shopping centre in Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong developed jointly by Swire Properties and CITIC Pacific between 1993 and 1998. At the time of its opening in November 1998, it was the biggest shopping mall in Hong Kong. There are also four floors of offices on top of the mall.

Festival Walk is located in Yau Yat Chuen, and is directly linked to Kowloon Tong Railway Station, which is an interchange station of the East Rail Line and the Kwun Tong Line of Hong Kong's Mass Transit Railway. Festival Walk has a direct rail connection to Mainland China. It also has a pedestrian link to the City University of Hong Kong.

Construction of the mall commenced in 1994 and was completed in 1998. Significant challenges were faced in the creation of the 21,000 m² site due to its terraced land form as well as its narrow land shape. The tunnels for the Kwun Tong Line of the MTR run through the full length of the site. During the construction of the building's four basement levels, 460,000 m³ of earth had to be removed.

Festival Walk was jointly owned by Swire Properties and CITIC Pacific until 2006, when Swire Properties bought out the 50% stake held by its partner. In July 2011, Mapletree Investments acquired the property for HK$18.8 billion (approximately US$2.4 billion), making it the world’s largest retail real estate deal in 2011.

In 2015 it was announced that the AMC Cinema, a major anchor tenant, would move to Yuen Long due to a rent increase that the director of Broadway Circuit (operator of the AMC chain in Hong Kong) called "very astonishing". The AMC cineplex had been a tenant of Festival Walk for over 17 years. The cinema will be replaced by an eight-screen MCL Cinema in 2016.

Festival Walk comprises some one million square feet of retail space. It has approximately 220 shops and restaurants, a multiplex cinema and an ice rink. Located above the mall is an additional 220,000 square feet (20,000 m²) of office space. Festival Walk's three level car park can accommodate 830 cars.