Dubai Mall

The Dubai Mall is 1,200 shops across 502,000 square metres, which makes it one of the largest malls in the world by total area. The numbers are meaningless until you are inside and realise you have been walking for 20 minutes and still have not reached the aquarium. The Dubai Aquarium viewing panel is free from the mall floor: an enormous tank with sharks, rays, and thousands of fish visible without paying the AED 159 tunnel entrance fee.

But the mall is more than shopping. There is a dinosaur skeleton (a 155-million-year-old Diplodocus, free to view), an Olympic-sized ice rink (AED 80 including skate rental), a VR park, a waterfall feature four storeys tall, and KidZania (a miniature city where children do adult jobs, AED 185). The food court on the lower ground floor has better variety and value than most of the sit-down restaurants, though the restaurants overlooking the fountain promenade are worth the premium at showtime.

The sheer scale is the thing that photography and descriptions cannot convey. You will get lost. You will walk more than you planned. The map on the Dubai Mall app is essential. The air conditioning is aggressive, bring a light layer. The metro connection (Burj Khalifa/Dubai Mall station) involves a 10-minute walk through an air-conditioned tunnel, which is its own experience in efficiency.

Is the Dubai Mall a mall? Technically. In practice it is a climate-controlled city within a city, and dismissing it as 'just shopping' misses what it represents about Dubai's approach to public space in a desert climate where outdoor gathering is impossible for half the year.