Midtown Madness

A new portion of the Robinson’s Place Manila was opened to the public. They called it Midtown.

What’s in a Name?

Midtown means a portion between uptown and downtown. Hmm, but Ermita, Manila is already considered as downtown Manila (In modern language, downtown could also mean the business district). But why did Robinson (Who’s Robinson?) preferred such a name? Maybe, this is an attempt to include uptown products to the downtown market (Huh? Like what?). And, to fuse both worlds so that people visiting the mall would still feel at home (The uptown feel!).

Originally, there was a hotel called Midtown in the exact place where the present Midtown is.

Features

When I first saw Midtown, I was really exhilarated. Whoa, this is a different world. It reminded me of New Makati Malls– wide and white. And hey, there’s classical music playing too (Which they eventually stopped playing)! Midtown also wants to cater to the Class A to the Class B Filipino people (And even others who pretend to be in a higher class). Just take a look at the roster of their stores: Designer Apparel stores, IT product stores and some Western-culture-inspired restaurants (Another batch of big points to the gargantuan level of our colonial mentality!) Robinson’s first attempt to cater to the rich kids of the society was the construction of the Padre Faura Wing. I think it did click but PF Wing was not that big and still owes an old make-up to the original mall itself. And another feature, let us not forget the Midtown condo units (I wanna live there!).

Ugly things

• Weirdly-placed escalators.
• Only one elevator.
• Weirdly-placed comfort rooms (Which is, btw, a Robinson’s Malls trademark).