The Ayala Center is a 50-hectare (120-acre) mixed-use major commercial development operated by Ayala Land located in Barangay San Lorenzo within the Makati Central Business District in Makati, Metro Manila, Philippines. The complex comprises three shopping malls, three department stores, each with its own retail shops, restaurant arcades and cinemas, several hotels, eight residential towers, five office towers, four parking buildings, and leisure amenities such as the Greenbelt Park, Glorietta 3 Park, and the Ayala Museum, showcasing exhibits on Philippine history and art.[1]
Ayala Center's predecessors were the Makati Commercial Center and Greenbelt, originally an open-space park called Greenbelt Junction in the 1970s.[3]
The Makati Commercial Center, built in 1960, consisted of several small arcades (Maranaw Arcade, Makati Arcade, Angela Arcade, Lising's Commercial, Mayfair Center, Bricktown, Anson's), theaters (Rizal Theater and Quad Cinemas), freestanding retail outlets (including Makati Supermart, Sulo Restaurant, Automat Restaurant, Rustan's, Shoe Mart and Mercury Drug), open parks, and hotels (including Manila Garden Hotel and InterContinental Hotel Manila).[4][5] It was later renamed The Center Makati in the 1980s.[6]
On the other hand, Greenbelt evolved from an open-space park known as Greenbelt Junction, which in the 1970s had an aviary and surrounding low-rise structures with dining establishments.[7][8] Additional developments in the 1980s include the Greenbelt Square, Fair Center, Greenbelt Arcade, a McDonald's branch, and Greenbelt Mall, which were later combined to form the old Greenbelt 1.[9]
In the 1990s, the Ayalas redeveloped The Center Makati by merging the existing Makati Commercial Center with the Greenbelt complex into a new 50-hectare (120-acre) development[1][10][11] and was renamed Ayala Center in 1991. Its redevelopment has been ongoing in phases since the late 2000s, which includes the renovation and expansion of Glorietta and Greenbelt malls and replacing old buildings and open parking spaces with new office buildings, residential towers, hotels, and the One Ayala complex, respectively.[12][13]
Aside from the basement parking beneath Glorietta (interconnected with Park Terraces and Terraces Square), Greenbelt, and One Ayala, respectively, the following are the carpark buildings located at the complex:
Holiday Inn Manila (foreground) with Park Terraces, Makati Fairmont Hotel, and Raffles Makati on the background. Also shown is the Glorietta 1 Corporate Center (right).
On May 17, 2000, at 5:02 p.m. PHT, Glorietta was bombed, injuring 12 persons, mostly teenagers. According to local authorities, the homemade bomb was placed in front of a toilet beside a video arcade. This bombing was said to be a precursor to the May 21, 2000 SM Megamall bombing and the December 30, 2000 Rizal Day bombings.
The 2007 Glorietta explosion ripped through the Glorietta 2 section of the Glorietta shopping complex at Ayala Center in Makati on October 19, 2007, killing 11 people and injuring 120. Despite conflicting reports, it was concluded that the explosion was caused by a faulty liquefied petroleum gas tank in a Chinese restaurant.