How The Landmark mall revived Central after hours, and lived up to its name

When Hongkong Land posted signs around its massive Central property redevelopment in 1979 announcing the upcoming opening of The Landmark, the mall’s title drew derision in some circles.

“We hear the latest game on the cocktail circuit is to suggest how this name might be bettered when the next one is built,” a Post columnist wrote. “Front runners in popularity, we hear, are ‘The Eyesore’ and ‘The Monstrosity’.”

In 1977, the company had begun to tear down five old properties on Queen’s Road Central – Gloucester Building, Lane Crawford House, Marina House, Windsor House and Edinburgh House, none taller than eight floors – to make way for the 47-storey Gloucester Tower complex, which the Post described as “an edifice”. Edinburgh Tower was added to the complex three years later; the company had been uncertain whether the first tower would saturate the business district’s grade-A office property market.

A modern, upscale retail concept for its time, The Landmark was intended to “bring life back to Central” after hours, when office workers left for livelier nightlife areas such as Causeway Bay and Tsim Sha Tsui. It featured 20,000 sq ft of open space, plus 80 shops, boutiques, banks and restaurants, and would usher in a new era in convenience and comfort, the company said.

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According to the publicity blurb: “The Gloucester Tower complex … brings back a natural rendezvous to Central in the form of its huge air-conditioned atrium … a public space with trees, shops, restaurants and boulevard cafes overlooking the plaza itself.”