New labels flock to $1b centre
Precinct Properties has unveiled its final list of the retailers set to open in its $1 billion downtown Auckland Commercial Bay development this time next month.
The three-level, innercity shopping and dining centre, in the final stages of construction, will be home to 120 retailers and about 35 food and beverage operators.
London-based fashion retailer Because will open its first New Zealand store within Commercial Bay, a flagship site on two floors, joining already-opened Swedish fashion retailer H&M, Spark and menswear retailer Rod & Gunn on opposite corners of the property.
Australian jeans brand General Pants has also taken on a large retail site within the development, along with fellow Australian retailer lifestyle and apparel retailers Husk, Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Kate Spade, Hershel Supply Co and Scotch & Soda – all new to New Zealand.
Along lower Queen St next to Cos, Lululemon, cosmetics retailer Mecca and Hugo Boss will open stores. Activewear brand Lorna Jane will open a store in the “Little Queen St laneway” next to H&M.
Other retailers set to open stores in the centre next month include luxury handbag brand Furla, Barkers, Superette, 3 Wise Men, Kookai, Just Another Fisherman, Sandro & Maje, Storm, Federation, Asics, Icebreaker, Twenty Seven Names, Ripcurl, L’Occitane, Solect and Parfums Christian Dior.
Precinct Properties chief executive Scott Pritchard told the Weekend Herald the shopping centre had been designed to be “the opposite” of a typical shopping mall, and was expected to draw in more than 10 million people each year.
“Your experience is going to be unique here. There’s some nooks and crannies and some interesting things to find [and] people are going to love the fact that it’s integrating an entire city block . . . as well as a whole lot of civic space. We can’t wait to open it.”
Many of the new-tomarket brands, including Husk and General Pants, were attracted to Commercial Bay because of its city-centre location. Retailers also liked being close to Queen St, he said.
“That area of lower Queen St is going to be remarkable once it is complete – a new civic space for Auckland – it will be really similar to some [other flagship] cities around the world.”
Sacha Laing, chief executive of General Pants, said the denim retailer’s Commercial Bay store would mark its first CBD store within New Zealand.
“We think that the Commercial Bay development is of a worldclass standard and to have our first CBD store in that centre, we are very excited about,” Laing said.