EmQuartier

EmQuartier stands on Sukhumvit Road in Bangkok's Watthana district, linked by walkway to Phrom Phong station on the BTS Sukhumvit Line and next to Benchasiri Park. It opened in May 2015 at a cost of about 800 million US dollars and is run by The Mall Group, which also operates Emporium across the road and the newer EmSphere. Together the three malls are promoted as the EM District.

The mall was designed by Leeser Architecture and is split into three buildings, called the Helix, Waterfall and Glass Quartiers. In 2018 it won a Prix Versailles special prize for shopping centres in the South Asia and Pacific region.

The Helix Quartier is the best-known part: a spiral floor slab winds upward through six levels of restaurants, so diners can walk from one floor to the next along a continuous ramp. The Waterfall Quartier is named after a five-storey water wall, and the Glass Quartier has a curtain wall of glass facing Sukhumvit. On the fifth floor, an open-air garden with trees and paths gives a green break above the traffic. The mall also has an eight-screen cinema including an IMAX screen, a supermarket and a pedestrian street.

Shops range from international luxury and fashion brands to Thai designers, cafés and food halls, making it one of the main shopping stops on the Sukhumvit corridor.

Entry is free. Foreign visitors can register for a tourist card at the information counter, which offers discounts in some stores. Come in the evening, when the Helix restaurants are busiest and the garden is cooler, and use the BTS skywalk to avoid road traffic.

How big is EmQuartier? The complex stands on a plot of about 50 rai next to Benchasiri Park, at 689 to 695 Sukhumvit Road, with roughly 250,000 square metres of floor space. Thomas Leeser of Leeser Architecture led the design, with BOIFFILS Architecture responsible for the interiors. The open-air garden on the fifth floor rises about 30 feet with trees and seating, and the five-storey waterfall runs beside a pedestrian street lined with shops.

Drivers can use two underground parking levels, an automated parking system and a parking tower, though the BTS is the easier way in at rush hour.