25°2′53″N 121°33′44″E / 25.04806°N 121.56222°E / 25.04806; 121.56222

Core Pacific City
京華城
Map
LocationSongshan, Taipei, Taiwan
Opening dateNovember 2001
Closing date30 November 2019
ArchitectShopping mall
Total retail floor area204,190 m2
No. of floors19
ParkingYes
Public transit accessNanjing Sanmin MRT station
Websitelivingmall.com.tw
Living Mall Atrium

Core Pacific City, also known as the Living Mall (Chinese: 京華城), was a shopping center in Songshan District, Taipei, Taiwan.

History

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The shopping mall was built in 2001. During the mall's development and construction, it was touted as the world's first truly 24-hour mall and Asia's first "city within a city" complex.[1] When it first opened, the mall was open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.[2]

Before Core Pacific opened in 2001, its management had been fined by the Taipei city government for failing fire safety inspections. Further fines were levied when the mall opened to the public without actually first obtaining an operating license.[3] In February 2002, a fire at the mall required the evacuation of 20,000 people. The fire was determined to be arson, and in July 2002 former Core Pacific official Lin Chang-cheng (林長成) was convicted of the crime along with two others, Wang Lin-kwun (王林坤) and Lin Ching-chi (林清吉). Losses were estimated at NT$12 million.[4] The opening of Taipei 101's mall in 2003 was expected to affect the revenues of Core Pacific's tenants, although less severely than at other malls due to Core Pacific's lower price points.[5] In 2004, the mall's management company was cited by Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission for unfair trade practices relating to a gift certificate promotion campaign.[6]

In March 2018, the Core Pacific Group put up the shopping mall for auction with real estate broker Cushman & Wakefield. The auction opened to the public on 12 December 2018 with an opening price of NT$38 billion.[7]

Core Pacific City closed on 30 November 2019 and subsequently demolished.[8] On its final day of operation, 100,000 people came to the mall.[9]

Architecture

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The shopping mall had a total floor space of 204,190 m2.[10] The structure was a complex of two buildings - an L-shaped building which contains specialty boutiques connected to a sphere which contains the Mira Department Store. The complex consisted of 12 above-ground stories and 7 underground levels. Core Pacific's total 19 story height is attributed to Taipei's extremely expensive land costs.[11]

The sphere, considered to be Core Pacific's most dominant and visible feature, is 11 stories tall and clad in granite imported from Finland, while the L-shaped portion features granite from Spain.[12] The mall's architects were the Jerde Partnership and Artech, Inc.[13] Jerde won the 2002 Gold Nugget Special Award of Excellence at the Pacific Coast Builders Conference/Western Building Show for its effort.[14] The engineering firm Arup was also recognized in 2002 for its work on the mall with a Structural Engineering Association of California Award for Excellence.[15]

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  • The mall appeared on The Amazing Race 19 as the site of a Hazard task for the Vegas showgirls Kaylani & Lisa, where they had to perform an indoor bungee jump.
  • In the 2003 video game SimCity 4 developed by Maxis, the mall was selected as a landmark which players can choose to build in their cities.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Shopping Centers Today Archived 2007-10-23 at archive.today
  2. ^ "English". Archived from the original on 2007-09-12. Retrieved 2007-09-10., [1]
  3. ^ Taipei Times – archives
  4. ^ [2], [3]
  5. ^ Shopping Centers Today Archived 2008-11-20 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ^ "Core Pacific City Co., Ltd. committed an obviously unfair act sufficient to affect trading order in violation of the law by its incomplete disclosure of information concerning the use of and restrictions on gift certificate redemption in a promotional campaign". Archived from the original on 2006-09-25. Retrieved 2007-09-10.
  7. ^ DeAeth, Duncan (18 July 2018). "Taipei's Core Pacific City to be auctioned with starting price of US$1.24 billion". Taiwan News. Retrieved 22 July 2018.
  8. ^ Wu, Po-wei; Yeh, Joseph (28 November 2019). "Lights turned off at Core Pacific City mall after 18 years in Taipei". Central News Agency. Retrieved 1 December 2019. Republished as: "Tycoon says goodbye to Living Mall". Taipei Times. 30 November 2019. Retrieved 1 December 2019.
  9. ^ Pan, Tzu-yu; Ko, Lin (30 November 2019). "Core Pacific City mall closes doors, attracting 100,000 people". Central News Agency. Retrieved 1 December 2019.
  10. ^ Taipei Shopping | iExplore.com Archived 2007-09-21 at the Wayback Machine
  11. ^ Shopping Centers Today Archived 2009-01-19 at the Wayback Machine
  12. ^ Taiwan retail complex is clad in Finnish granite. | Stone World (October , 2002)
  13. ^ Portfolio [ Corporate & Institutional ] Archived 2004-12-15 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ^ Jerde : Awards Archived 2007-10-17 at the Wayback Machine
  15. ^ Structural Engineering Association of California Awards for excellence | Arup Archived 2006-03-23 at the Wayback Machine
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Core Pacific City on Facebook