Bashundhara City in Bangladesh
Bashundhara City is a shopping mall located in Dhaka, Bangladesh with a rotunda architecture. Opened to the public on 6 August 2004, the mall is located at Panthapath, near Karwan Bazar, in Dhaka city. Bashundhara City is 21 stories tall, of which 8 are used for the mall and the remaining floors are used as the corporate headquarters of the Bashundhara Group.
The mall has space for 2,500 retail stores and cafeterias and also possesses a large underground gymnasium, a multiplex styled movie theater and top floor food court along with an indoor theme park. The fully air-conditioned shopping mall with rooftop gardens is considered a modern symbol of the emerging city of Dhaka.
Up to 25,000 people visit the mall daily, which is the first western style mall in the city, designed by the Principal Architect Mustapha Khalid Palash and Mohammad Foyez Ullah of Vistaara. The cost of the building is more than $100 million; construction started in 1998. The building has been described as an indication of the severe division between the middle class and the lower class. It is one of the showcases of the development in Bangladesh. The mall is closed on tuesday of every week.
Aarong outlet in Bangladesh
Aarong is a chain of retail outlets located in the major cities of Bangladesh. It is an enterprise of BRAC, the largest non-governmental development organisation in the world. In the Bangla language, "Aarong" means a village fair. At present Aarong has 10 domestic outlets (6 in Dhaka, 2 in Chittagong, 1 in Sylhet and 1 in Khulna), 1 franchise in London as well as considerable export operation in many European, North American and Asian countries. Aarong started its venture in 1978 and currently supports over 65,000 Bangladeshi artisans of whom 85 percent are women. Through a network of 647 production sub-centers and 13 production centers, Aarong has developed a platform for the underprivileged artisans across more than 2000 villages of Bangladesh, where they can utilize their indigenous skills to earn a living. Aarong works in collaboration with the Ayesha Abed Foundation, which provides the artisans the platform to exercise their expertise. Additionally, thousands of independent artisans, small entrepreneurs also earn their livelihood by marketing their craft products through Aarong . Aarong's mission is to help sustain rural craftsmanship and find a wider market for their products nationally and internationally.
Aarong products include Nakshikantha, pottery, crafts on brass, jute, wood, candles, leather, hand woven cloth and silk products, jewelry and a wide variety of trendy yet indigenous products. The store specialties include Nakshikantha (a traditional form of embroidery rooted to the core of Bangladeshi village women) and Jamdani sarees.
