Power Plant Mall

Power Plant Mall sits on ground with an unusually specific backstory: it's built where a 130-megawatt Rockwell Thermal Plant once stood, operated by the Lopez family's Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company from 1950 until a fire shut it down in December 1973. Neighborhood opposition kept the site from reopening as a power plant, and in the mid-1990s the Lopezes' Rockwell Land Corporation converted it into a mixed-use commercial district instead. The mall, designed by Toronto firm Design International, opened on December 26, 2000, anchored by The Marketplace supermarket, an eight-screen cinema, and boutiques for Salvatore Ferragamo, Michael Kors, DKNY, Rolex, and Hackett London. A 2014 expansion added 5,700 square meters of retail space and two more cinema levels, bringing the mall's total footprint to roughly 46,700 square meters across five floors. It also connects via elevated footbridge to the neighboring Proscenium and Joya residential towers, and houses a Catholic chapel dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Rockwell Land is now exporting the format outside Manila, with Power Plant Mall locations planned for Angeles City and Bacolod later this decade.