Massive “Famous Furnishings Expo Park” Project Unveiled

Dongguan Famous Furniture Assoc. to build year-round showroom complex in Houjie

The Dongguan Famous Furniture Association, organizer of the International Famous Furniture Fair (Dongguan), unveiled a massive project to further build its reputation as a trade group overseeing a world-class furniture supply hub in southern China. Occupying over 13 million square feet and dubbed “Famous Furnishings Expo Park,” the project was unveiled to an audience of 1,000 people on Dec. 20, 2011 in Houjie, where the FFEP is designed to be a multifunctional complex, beside being home to the IFFF, to include a skyscraper, the International Furnishings Center, and two major malls or year-round showrooms, one for home furnishings and one for building materials.

The government of Guangdong Province—the most economically-advanced province in China with cities like Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Dongguan under its jurisdiction—announced the plan to build Houjie into an International Furniture Procurement Center.

International Furnishing Center
The International Furnishing Center (IFC) will be a giant multiplex of 102 floors and 480 meters high, housing a research and design institute, an inspection and testing center, a media center, an international convention center, a furniture college, an intellectual property rights protection center, a furniture cultural center, offices of furniture manufacturers and traders, a custom declaration and inspection center as well as a six-star hotel. With exterior of LOE glass curtain and a top-floor observation deck with helipad, the IFC will be the highest building in the world for home furnishing industry.

The home furnishing mall will be the first building to be completed and to be put to use in March 2013. With 8 floors, including 2 floors underground, building area of 350,000 square meters, stylish interior, multiple canyon-shaped atriums, 14 elevators and 136 escalators, ground-floor and underground parking, the mall will be a comprehensive, year-round shopping center.

The first floor of the mall will be the branded floor, showcasing 60 globally-leading home furnishing brands with flagship stores of 2,000 square meters and 8 meters in height. The second to fourth floors will accommodate the flagship stores of over 1,000 home furnishing producers and serve as a year-round showroom of the International Famous Furniture Fair. The fifth floor is inspired by New York's Fifth Avenue and Paris Champs Elysees to be a lifestyle floor, featuring entertainment facilities and ballrooms. The sixth floor will accommodate an IMAX cinema, fine restaurants and food courts, language and music learning centers.

The basement floor will house stores of home decorations, providing a comprehensive shopping experience for designers and buyers from all around the world.

Building Materials Trade Area
The Building Materials Trade Area will be spread over 350,000 square meters, to introduce leading global names in building materials and feature products including masonry, bathroom, lighting, curtain and home textile items, becoming an integrated building material procurement destination.

The design and planning of the FFEP actually started two years ago and the IFC was designed to be 20 floors, but intense interest from the industry motivated the design to be modified to 56 floors and finally 102 floors. In fact, 362 people had submitted tenant application forms at the event announcement.