Khan Shatyr. The largest tent in the world

Khan Shatyr is not only the largest shopping center in Kazakhstan, but also a unique architectural structure. Stylized as a Kazakh yurt, it is a huge transparent tent 150 m high, making it the largest tent structure in the world. The name of the shopping center is translated from Kazakh as “khan among the tents.” In Russian there are similar names, for example, Tsar Bell or Tsar Cannon.

More than 10 football fields could be laid under the dome of Khan Shatyr. The total area of the largest shopping center in Kazakhstan is 127,000 square meters. m. On four floors there is infrastructure for the best shopping and recreation in Astana: almost 200 shops, a huge supermarket, a variety of restaurants and cafes, a cinema, a Fame City gaming center with a “Dinopark” and attractions, a water park, swimming pools, gyms and even a real tropical resort with beach. The Atrium and Sky Beach Club host various events and parties. For visitors there is a parking lot for 700 cars.

Cinema in Khan Shatyr

There is a 6-screen cinema chain on the second floor of the shopping center Chaplin Cinemas, equipped with the latest technology. Here you can see all the latest world cinema in the highest quality - with clear pictures and surround, realistic sound provided by the Dolby Atmos speaker system. The Real 3D and K system allows you to watch movies in 3D. Glasses for watching 3D movies must be purchased separately. The price of 3D glasses is 150 tenge, the clip attachment for glasses with diopters will cost 450 tenge.

All six cinema halls in Khan Shatyr are equipped with branded chairs, “adapted” to the human anatomy and providing the viewer with maximum comfort during a film show. The food bar on the premises of the cinema sells snacks that you can take into the theater and “chew” while watching the movie. The food bar is located right next to the cash register.

Cinema poster

The Chaplin cinema shows Kazakh, European, American and Russian films and cartoons. The premieres of the most anticipated film projects occur simultaneously with the world ones. The film schedule is available on the cinema's official website.

Sky Beach Club in Khan Shatyr

Under the very dome of Khan Shatyr is its main feature - Sky Beach Club. This is the first and only recreation center in Kazakhstan that imitates a real tropical resort. It’s +35 degrees here all year round, and visitors will find a beach covered with sand brought from the Maldives. Thanks to a special heating system, a complete feeling of being at a resort is created. Visitors can lie on the warm sand or sip a cocktail on a sun lounger. There are also 2 swimming pools, a water park, a sauna and a jacuzzi. The Sky Beach Club regularly hosts parties dedicated to various holidays or dedicated to some theme. Yoga classes are offered.

Pool

The resort in Khan Shatyr is equipped with two swimming pools. The large pool has the following parameters: length - 25 m, depth - 1.4 m, water temperature +28 degrees. The small pool uses the wave effect. Visitors can swim or simply lie on the waves, listening to the sound of the waves and enjoying the tropical views.

Aquapark

The water park at Sky Beach Club is small. There are only a few slides, but they are quite high, so it will be interesting for both adults and children to slide down them. It is hardly worth considering the water park in Khan Shatyr as an independent entertainment - it is an excellent addition to the resort infrastructure of the club.

Prices

The entrance ticket price is:

10,000 tenge - adult ticket;
6,000 tenge - children's ticket.

Children under 5 years old are admitted free of charge.

Visitors are provided with a towel. Additional towels, slippers and bathrobes are available at an additional cost.

You can also purchase passes for 3, 6 and 12 months, which will make your holiday at the resort cheaper. In addition, the club has a number of special offers that allow you to save on tickets on certain days and times. The full list of offers can be found on the official website.

Shopping complex inside

The shopping center building looks very impressive both outside and inside. In the internal space, organized according to the principle of an atrium, there are three support posts on which a tent made of transparent polymer material “stitched” with steel cables is “put on”. All structural elements are open, so you can carefully examine them and enjoy the unusual beauty, especially the grandiose dome. The sun's rays, passing through the transparent tent, allow you to see the openwork supports from the street, thanks to which the shopping complex takes on an even more futuristic look. A three-layer polymer coating protects the space under the dome from sudden temperature changes characteristic of the harsh climate of the capital of Kazakhstan and creates an optimal microclimate inside.

The author of this magnificent project is the British architect Norman Foster, one of the creators of the high-tech style, a follower of the great Russian engineer V. G. Shukhov. In addition to Khan Shatyr, the Palace of Peace and Reconciliation (co-authored with Gulzifa Abileva) and the Library of the First President were built in Astana according to Foster’s design.

The Khan Shatyr shopping center was opened on July 6, 2010. Forbes Style magazine included it in the top ten eco-buildings in the world, which no building in the CIS had previously received.

Thanks to Google panoramic photos you can find yourself inside Khan Shatyr without leaving your home

Shops in the Khan Shatyr shopping center

In the Khan Shatyr shopping center there are 197 boutiques where you can buy children's goods, clothes for women and men, shoes, bags, household goods, electronics, souvenirs, cosmetic products, sporting goods, etc. World brands are represented, both mass market and and the elite segment. There are stores of Russian chains.

0 floor: here is the Interfood supermarket, the Sportmaster sports store, the Sulpak electronics and household appliances store, the Evim home and interior goods store, and the Marwin children's goods store.

1st floor:

Men's and women's clothing: Mango, Motivi, Colin’s, Jack&Jones, Naf Naf, LC Waikiki, Adidas, Next, Under Armour, Calvin Clein, U.S. Polo, Lacoste, Massimo Dutti, Guess, Finn Flare, Levi’s, Miniso, Zara, Bershka, Pull&Bear, Terra Nova.
Men's clothing: Climber.
Shoes: Timberland, Caprisa.
Bags: Baldi.
Household products: Zara Home.
Sportswear and shoes: Adidas.
Decorations: Pandora.
Underwear: Oysho, Yamamay.
Electronics and household appliances: Bork

2nd floor:

Men's and women's clothing: New Yorker, LC Waikiki, Grazie, Name it, O'stin.
Men's clothing: Suvari, Bagozza, Mario Zell, Kanzler, Avva, Magnat.
Children's clothing and shoes: Adidas Kids, Tiflani, Acoola, F&F, LC Waikiki kids, O'stin kids.
Household products: LC Waikiki Home.
Underwear: Etam.
Shoes: Respect, Reiker, Baskoni, Good man&Luigi Traini, Ecco, Intertop, Flo, Marco Piero.
Leather and fur clothing: Mondial.
Sportswear and shoes: Reebok, Brux, New Balance.

3rd floor: On the top floor there is one store - "Children's World".

Restaurants

After active shopping or relaxation, visitors to the shopping center can have a snack in a cafe or restaurant. In total, there are more than 30 catering outlets in Khan Shatyr, offering European, Oriental, Asian and Russian cuisine.

One of the best places for lunch in the mall is a Turkish restaurant Ozyurt, where traditional oriental dishes are prepared - kebab, doner, chorba, pide. The establishment is halal, so alcohol is not served here, but you can enjoy tea with real oriental sweets. You can also have lunch at the restaurant Saliva, cafe "Hut" or bistro Neo.

Jolly&Joker- a stylishly decorated pub that serves delicious burgers and hosts noisy evening parties.

Coffee lovers will delight in coffee shops Ottoman, Caffe Latte, Gloria Jean's, Expresso and American Starbucks. Ice cream lovers should visit the cafe Movenpick. In the cafe Yagusha And Tutti Frutti frozen yogurt sold.

Of course, there are fast food restaurants of world chains in Khan Shatyr - KFC And Burger King.

How to get to the Khan Shatyr shopping center

Khan Shatyr is located on the left bank of the Ishim, in the new business district of Astana. From the central monument Baytarek to the shopping center is just over 2 km. If you are not afraid to walk for a long time, then you can include an inspection of the most unusual building of the Kazakh capital in a walk along Nurzhol Boulevard, which stretches from the residence of President Akorda almost to Khan Shatyr.

Pedestrian route from Baiterek to the Khan Shatyr shopping center

Buses to Khan Shatyr

The Khan Shatyr shopping center can be reached by city buses. The stop “Entertainment Center Khan Shatyr” is located right in front of the entrance to the shopping center.

Buses going to Khan Shatyr: No. 10, 29, 32, 46, 50, 53, 56.

Bus number 10 connects the shopping center with the old railway station and the airport. Route No. 32 - with the new Nurly Zhol station. Buses on other routes run between residential areas of Astana.

It will not be difficult to get to Khan Shatyr by taxi. The easiest way to call a taxi is through an online application. The following services are presented in Astana: Uber, Yandex. Taxi, Maxim.

Video of Khan Shatyr from above

“Khan Shatyr” fits harmoniously into the urban architecture of the capital. Many technologies and materials used in the construction of the complex are the latest developments in the field of construction and have not been used anywhere in the world before. The unique shell of the tent covering the building makes it possible to maintain a microclimate that is comfortable for humans inside, even if snowstorms and frosts are raging outside. Inside the building there are special stepped terraces planted with plants from different climatic zones of our planet. There is an observation deck on the topmost terrace, which offers a magnificent view of the winter gardens. In the center of the building there is a large area intended for holding various exhibitions and entertainment attractions.

On an area of 41 thousand square meters. m. there are all kinds of shopping pavilions, cafes, restaurants, cinemas. In addition to retail and service businesses, there are beauty salons and modern fitness centers. The tropical water garden and artificial lagoon are especially attractive to visitors. On its shore, a magnificent beach of snow-white sand has been recreated, which was specially brought from the distant islands of the Maldives archipelago. The lagoon is formed by several interconnecting pools, and artificially created waves splash on the surface of one of them. Here, at any time of the year, you can feel like you are at one of the Mediterranean resorts, without experiencing the difficulties of a tiring flight.

This building is incredibly different from most buildings not only in Astana, but also in many large cities in Kazakhstan and Russia. A very detailed National Geographic film in the “Superstructures” series talks about the stages of construction of a giant tent. Here are short excerpts from this film:

The construction of this fifty-story skyscraper, whose walls contain air, was carried out under very unfavorable conditions. Kazakhstan is a country where it is +40 in summer and -40 in winter.
The unique building was supposed to allow residents and guests of the city to find themselves on a warm beach even in the midst of severe frosts. The radical architect, the Englishman Sir Norman Foster, was ready to carry out such a project. The developer was the Turkish company Sembol Insaat, and its problem solver Selami Gurel did a lot to make up for the two years behind schedule.
This building has no underground floors. This solved two problems - the unstable marshland and the economic one. Therefore, the underground parking, located on the “zero” level, is actually located on the first floor of the building. There is a hypermarket on the same floor.
Initially, it was planned to complete the construction in just one year, but the construction of the tent dragged on for 4 years - having started in 2006, Khan Shatyr was opened to visitors only in July 2010.
The first layout of the giant tent was without tilt. However, the largest buildings in Astana are aligned along the central axis, so Khan Shatyr had to be tilted by 15º. For stability, they decided to use not just one axle, but a tripod - made up of three axles, each of which is about 150 meters long and weighs 2 thousand tons. They end in a node structure that helps distribute the load throughout the structure.
Lifting the substructure on a tripod and their final installation took a week.
The surface of the tent was assembled from 836 transparent “pillows” - this is an ETFE polymer coating. Each of them was of a unique size and had to be installed in a strictly defined place, otherwise the surface of the tent would not have taken its shape. The result was a “puzzle” with an area of more than 20 thousand m2. Their installation took place in severe frosts, so some installers risked their lives to build the innovative project.

This eco-friendly building was included in the top 10 eco-buildings around the world according to Forbes Style. Moreover, it became the only representative of the CIS.

The Khan Shater entertainment center in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, is an architectural project that is billed as the world's largest marquee. The "tent" is made of transparent material and rests on a network of cables stretched from a central spire 150 meters high. The 200-meter elliptical dome base covers an area of 140,000 square meters. The space under the tent is larger than 10 football stadiums, contains an indoor park, a variety of shops and entertainment venues, a river for boat rides, a shopping centre, mini golf and a man-made seaside resort. The transparent material allows sunlight to pass through, which, together with air heating and cooling systems, maintains a comfortable internal temperature between 15–30 °C, while the outdoor temperature varies between -35 and 35 °C throughout the year.

To prevent condensation in winter, three transparent layers of special EFTE transparent fabric are used to channel warm air. In summer, cooled air is supplied there, which is well ventilated through special openings. Thanks to its transparency, during the daytime the interior space is illuminated exclusively by sunlight. In the dark, the tent itself is visible from afar, since due to internal lighting the light softly filters through the dome.

Opened in 2010 by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Khan Shatyr has been described as the “latest vanity project” of Kazakhstan's increasingly autocratic president (The Guardian).

Nazarbayev moved the capital of Kazakhstan to the isolated northern city from Almaty in 1998 and named it Astana, which literally means "capital". On the tenth anniversary of the capital's move, the president signed a decree declaring July 6 Astana Day. The name "Khan Shatyr" roughly translates as "tent of the khan or king."

And here is the artificial resort mentioned above. Of course, it is not as large as a tropical island under a dome in Germany, but it is also very cozy and comfortable.

Now let's find out more about him...

In the capital of Kazakhstan in 2010, construction of the world's largest tent was completed. This is exactly what the Khan Shatyr shopping and entertainment center looks like. The majestic dome of the tent rose to a height of 150 meters, and the total area it occupies was 100,000 square meters. The author of the project was the famous British architect Norman Foster from the Foster + Partners bureau, who had previously designed other, no less interesting objects for Astana, for example, the “Pyramid of the World”, opened in September 2006. It housed an opera house and a center for cultural studies.

The architectural and construction concept is designed to “fight” the harsh climatic situation of ancient Saryarka. The new entertainment center of the capital features several natural landscape areas. The harmony of light, humidity and temperature is controlled throughout the year and will become the main condition of comfort for city residents, existing in the difficult metropolitan climate. There is a lot of greenery here, and it represents different climatic zones on the stepped terraces, a lot of light, which easily penetrates through the continuous mesh structure covered with modern material. A tropical water garden, open to the guests of the center through the interweaving of the landscape, a wave pool, a river and a waterfall are ideally integrated into the architectural design of the building. All this can be admired from the topmost terrace, equipped with an observation deck with an excellent view of the entire park.

A spacious flexible area in the center of the building is allocated for exhibition and entertainment events. 40,000 comfortable square meters are given over to all kinds of cafeterias, restaurants, cinemas and shops. All “thirty-three pleasures” will be offered to visitors to the Khan Shatyr center: here you can fully relax in an exotic climate, enjoy the latest in world cinema, taste “nectar and ambrosia” from the best chefs of the capital and enjoy quality shopping.

The space of the Khan Shatyr shopping and entertainment center was carefully thought out: the main goal of the location of the zones was to achieve maximum comfort for guests. Thus, on the zero level there is a hypermarket, to which direct access will be provided from a closed parking lot. In addition, convenient elevators will bring shoppers from the first level of colorful boutiques, which will be located in the so-called retail zone - in the lobby above the hypermarket. All this space will be open and therefore clearly visible.

A closed parking lot for 700 parking spaces is located here, on level zero. In addition, a closed external parking lot for the same number of spaces at the local level will be connected to the main building of the center by external covered walkways.

There is a Multiplex cinema here, designed for 450 visitors and having six screening rooms.
On the way to the seventh level, where the observation deck will be located, guests will be able to enjoy the spectacle of lush gardens and landscape compositions located on the terraces. Mediterranean palm trees, fruit trees, exotic flowers, a riot of tropics - a separate landscape solution will be used for each park level. By the way, supporters of sports and health procedures will not have to climb too high - the third floor will offer them everything that humanity has come up with in this area. Gym, massage, aerobics, yoga, sauna - everything is most conveniently located next to the relevant shops and a children's play area.

But the special charm for the residents of the stormy steppe Saryarka is probably the three interconnected pools, with a sandy beach stretching along them and palm trees growing around them. A wave pool, a slow-moving river and an active pool with an adjustable bottom are a great opportunity to imagine yourself somewhere in the Bahamas without the “delights” of a tiring flight.

General information:
The area of the hypermarket is 4,000 sq. m. meters
The area of the retail trade zone is 19,000 sq. m. meters
The area of the central space is 1500 sq. meters
The area of the observation deck is 400 sq. meters

The opening ceremony of Khan Shatir, which was timed to coincide with Astana Day, was attended by the presidents of many countries: Russia, Turkey, Armenia, Ukraine and Tajikistan

The “walls” of the tent are made of transparent polymer fiber, which not only transmits light, but also has a high level of thermal insulation. Thanks to this, the air temperature in the tent remains at summer temperature all year round.

Khan Shatyr (Khan's Tent), designed by the famous British architect Lord Norman Foster, is one of the most recognizable buildings in Astana. This is the largest tented structure in the world, the height of which reaches 150 meters.

The outer walls of the complex consist of a special translucent plastic stretched over hundreds of metal cables. 650 climbers from seven countries took part in the installation of the structure. The five floors of the Tent of Khan are illuminated by natural sunlight, and at night there are fantastic lighting.

Transparent walls add additional charm to the year-round resort area on the 4th floor, where the water park pools and sandy beach with real plants are located. There is also a SPA center and entertainment area.

On weekends, “Khan Shatyr” can be visited by about 30 thousand people at the same time. It is located in the center of New Astana, which is also called the “Millennium Axis”. From here you have a magnificent view of the city.

The shops

Grocery hypermarket GREEN - minus 1 floor
Debenhams Department Store - 2nd floor
ZARA - 1st floor
NewYorker - 2nd floor

Shopping gallery

GAP, Reebok, Adidas, Nike, Trussardi, Finn Flare, Orchestra, Yves Rocher, L"Occitane, Bershka, Next, Pull&Bear, Timberland, Springfield, Cortifiel, Tween Damat, Climber, Colin"s, O"Stin, LTB, Lacoste , Vero Moda, Jack Jones, Intertop, Mondian, Swarovsky, Steve Madden, Nine West, Baldinini, Geox, Clarks, Ramsey, Celio, Carlo Pazolini, Women" Secret, La Senza, Berghoff, LC Waikiki, Ecco, Glamour, Motivi, Respect, Elite eBrends, Spring.

Entertainment area

Multiplex Star Cinema - 2nd floor
Entertainment center Cosmo - 4th floor
Beach Resort Sky Beach Club
SPA & Wellness center
Food court, restaurants and cafes

City buses No. 20, 32, 35, 43, 46 go to the shopping center.