Here in this hot and haughty city, you might not expect a shopping mall to elicit much excitement. After all, this is the self-proclaimed Paris of Africa, a relative oasis of sophistication and style that shames its shabby neighbors with fine French cuisine, gleaming skyscrapers and a seaside Club Med.
But since the doors to L'Espace Latrille opened just in time for the Christmas shopping season - giving Abidjan its first genuine American-style mall - composure has been hard to find amid the air-conditioned aisles, fake Christmas trees, sprawling parking lot and fast-food court."It's a universe of pleasure and escapism!" burble the ads promoting L'Espace, 10,000 square meters of blinding white mall surrounded by a 600-space parking lot manned by attendants who guide patrons into spaces and shield them from the rain with huge umbrellas.
Not even cellular telephones and Internet providers, both new arrivals in Abidjan, have created such a sensation in this cosmopolitan city of 2 million.
On weekend nights, busy Boulevard Latrille outside the mall is bumper-to-bumper with taxis and private cars. Teenagers flirt around the central fountain while their elders, dressed as if attending an opening night on Broadway, wander wide-eyed past shop windows lined in twinkling Christmas lights.
A glass elevator linking the two levels is crammed with children screaming in delight as they glide up and down.
L'Espace's centerpiece is the "hypermarket" - touted as west Africa's first - selling everything from electronic goods to international newspapers to clothing, food, and fine wine.
The mall also includes, among its 30 other shops, a bookstore, travel agency, fitness club, tea salon, wine bar, chic clothing and shoe shops and a junk-food corner of establishments specializing in Italian, Tex-Mex, Lebanese and Chinese dishes. Watching over the tables is a plastic Ronald McDonald look-alike.
A movie theater and pub are coming soon, says Claude Costecalde of Sococe, the Lebanese-owned import-export business that created L'Espace Latrille.
This might not sound like much to anyone living in a mall society - which means just about anywhere other than west Africa - but it's revolutionary in this part of the world.
Shopping in west Africa usually means bargaining with hawkers at chaotic outdoor markets or searching ill-stocked stores and boutiques scattered haphazardly across cities. Big supermarkets exist in Abidjan, but like virtually every other business they take a three-hour lunch break, reopen only until 7:30 p.m. and stay closed Sundays and holidays.
As a result, workers have had to leave the office during business hours to go shopping.
The prices are comparable with those in stores across the city - in other words, sky-high for imported items such as Kellogg's Corn Flakes ($6 a box) and Planter's peanut butter ($5 for a tiny jar). But cheap local food is also available, and the clientele is a mix of locals and expats, wealthy and middle-class.