
Muhallab Mall Kuwait: Inside the Ship-Shaped Landmark of Hawally
Most malls in Kuwait play it safe with their architecture. Muhallab Mall, in Hawally, didn’t. Its design takes its cue from a mohallab — a traditional Kuwaiti seafaring vessel — and turns that into a genuine architectural statement: a curved, ship-like structure that stands out even in a city with no shortage of shopping centres. The story behind the design The mall was built on a footprint of over 7,500 square metres and designed to evoke Kuwait’s maritime history, a theme that runs through the country’s identity long before oil transformed its economy. The building was constructed by one of Kuwait’s largest contracting firms and designed by an international architecture practice working alongside a local consultant, with the project delivered for Wafra Real Estate Company. Structurally, the mall includes a service basement, an additional basement level, and four upper floors of mixed commercial use, connected to a separate multi-storey car park via both a tunnel and a bridge. That car park alone was built to hold hundreds of vehicles, which tells you the scale the developers were planning for from day one. What’s inside Over a hundred commercial retail outlets across the mall’s floors Multiple cinema screens for a full










