DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The Middle East is getting the world’s first Macy’s department store outside the United States and, for good measure, its second Bloomingdale’s too.
Property developer Gulf Related and Dubai-based retail conglomerate Al Tayer Group said Tuesday that they plan to open both stores in a new shopping center being built in the United Arab Emirates capital, Abu Dhabi.
The mall, known as Al Maryah Central, is expected to cost about $1 billion and should open in spring 2018. It will be next to an existing shopping mall known as The Galleria, on al-Maryah island, a rapidly developing area just across the water from Abu Dhabi’s central business district.
Abu Dhabi is the largest and richest of the seven sheikdoms that make up the Emirates. It controls the bulk of the OPEC country’s oil wealth.
The nearby Emirati city of Dubai already boasts the first overseas branch of Bloomingdale’s.
