Val d'Europe (mall)
Val d’Europe is a shopping mall located 30 minutes to the east of Paris, the French capital and 5 minutes from the Disneyland Paris theme park and the Villages Nature holiday village. Opened in 2000, the mall has 190 shops and 30 restaurants, covering over 1,000,000 square feet since its most recent expansion completed in March 2017. History The beginnings of the mall can be traced to 1987 when 6 institutions – the state, the Île-de-France region, the Seine-et-Marne department, RATP Group, and government development companies: EPA Marne and EPA France – gave 1943 hectares to the Walt Disney Company, for the construction of an urban project near the pre-existing theme park. The aim of this project was to re-balance the economic development of the Île-de-France region and the East of the Paris basin. It was not until 1996 that agreements on the proposed development were signed between the land owners, Eurodisney CSA, and developers, Ségécé, for the creation of a large shopping mall. Construction began in October 1998 and the mall was opened two years later, on 25 October 2000. In 2002, Val d’Europe won an ICSC International European Shopping Centre PROCOS award in the New Developments: Large Centres category. The mall has undergone numerous expansion projects, including one in 2003 for the opening of the Delbard garden centre, which won the ICSC International prize for Innovative Design and Construction, and an almost 11,000 square foot (1000m2) extension of the “Les Terrasses” food court in 2006. In 2010, Eurodisney passed the land to the Klépierre group. The mall has been able to stay open on Sundays since 2016, when it gained the status of an “international tourist area” (ZTI in French), as Disneyland Paris was the first tourist attraction in Europe to have 15 million visitors per year. In 2017, the mall underwent further renovation and expansion of over 170,000 square feet creating 30 new stores and 8 restaurants. Architecture Design The centre was designed and built by an international team: Graham Gund (USA), Chapman Taylor (Great Britain) and Lobjoy & Bouvier (France). They worked together on the project and drew their inspiration from 19th century Parisian architecture. The resulting style drew freely from the three leading figures of the period: Gustave Eiffel, Victor Baltard, and Baron Georges Eugène Haussmann. The mall was divided into four shopping areas: Les Halles, a covered market over two buildings, inspired by Baltard's glass and metal constructions, which boasted large glazed ceilings, Les Passages Parisiens, which was reminiscent of 19th century shopping arcades, La Promenade, inspired by the famous Gare d’Orsay railway station and Parisian boulevards. It included coffered ceilings that cascaded inwards and downwards and were visible from its large glass façade, Les Terrasses, with live vegetation and a fountain in a setting of glass and cast iron, gave an environment that changes throughout the year. Les Terrasses also houses the mall's restaurants and is first mall in France to be built as an American-style food court. 2017 renovation In 2017, renovations