Colombo-stad
Colombo, de hoofdstad van Sri Lanka, is een dynamische stad die traditie en moderniteit combineert. Je vindt er koloniale architectuur, levendige markten en serene boeddhistische tempels. Met een gevarieerde keuken, een groeiende skyline en prachtige stranden is het een bruisend centrum voor zaken, cultuur en toerisme, en een ideale uitvalsbasis om de wonderen van Sri Lanka te verkennen.
House of Fashions
House of Fashions is Sri Lanka’s premier fashion landmark – the ultimate shopping experience. The beautiful nine-story building is the largest single owner retail store in the entirety of South Asia. Of course there are some bigger shopping malls in various places in South Asia. However, these are all rented out to or co-owned by a number of smaller stores, none of which alone are as large as House of Fashions. However to get to know this shopping giant better and capture its essence, its important to understand its history.
The Beginnings
House of Fashions was the brainchild of the couple Preethi and Neelamani Jayawardena. Preethi started his career as a sailor, while Neelamani started off as a Science graduate teaching Biology and Zoology. When Preethi made the decision to change his career path and move into business, he received the fullest support and intelligent input from his wife. Together, they decided to create a clothing store where the common locals in Sri Lanka could buy the best of fashions and follow the trends, all at a very low cost.
House of Fashions was born in 1992, in a tiny 10 foot by 10 foot shop that was rented in the Colombo Plaza. Preethi and Neelamani worked hard and put in their fullest commitment into making the shop a success. They put their heart and soul into caring for their customers, and maintaining their trust; and the customers started caring back. House of Fashions started gaining a loyal customer base. That was not to say that the store did not suffer any setbacks, it did go through hundreds. But sweat, blood and tears of Preethi and Neelamani helped it pull through. Soon House of Fashions started generating enough revenue that they were able to buy a land down Duplication Road in Bambalapitiya, and build a large five story shopping store. It was declared open in 1999 and had 50,000 square feet of floor space, and at the time the likes of it had never been seen in Sri Lanka before. It was compared to the stores in Malaysia and Singapore.
The Growth of House of Fashions
The store continued to grow along with its customer base. More employees were brought into the fold. Preethi and Neelamani started traveling abroad to get the best of fashions at the lowest cost. They did not attempt to make use of this to increase their profit margins. Instead, they transferred that low cost, with only a small profit margin over to their items on the shop floor. The customers loved it. They could get even branded items at the lowest prices. The shop expanded to include gifts, toys, a small selection of household goods, and winter wear. In fact, their winter wear line became so popular that both locals going abroad to colder countries, and foreigners who were visiting, started visiting House of Fashions solely to purchase winter wear.
Even as the popularity of House of Fashions grew, Preethi and Neelamani Jayawardene continued to be the same down-to-earth people they always were. They supporte
Over het district Colombo
Colombo is de grootste stad en commerciële hoofdstad van Sri Lanka. Het ligt aan de westkust van het eiland en grenst aan Sri Jayewardenepura Kotte, de hoofdstad van Sri Lanka. Colombo is een drukke en levendige stad met een mix van modern leven en koloniale gebouwen en ruïnes, en een stadsbevolking van 647.100. De metropoolregio Colombo, gedefinieerd door de districten Colombo, Gampaha en Kalutara, heeft een geschatte bevolking van 5.648.000 en beslaat een oppervlakte van 3.694,20 km². Colombo is een multi-etnische, multiculturele stad. Het is de meest bevolkte stad van Sri Lanka, met 642.163 mensen die binnen de stadsgrenzen wonen. De bevolking van Colombo is een mix van verschillende etnische groepen, voornamelijk Singalezen, Moren en Tamils. Er wonen ook kleine gemeenschappen van mensen met Chinese, Portugese, Nederlandse, Maleisische en Indiase afkomst in de stad, evenals talloze Europese expats. De overgrote meerderheid van de Sri Lankaanse bedrijven heeft hun hoofdkantoor in Colombo. Enkele van de industrieën die er actief zijn, zijn chemie, textiel, glas, cement, lederwaren, meubels en sieraden. In het stadscentrum staat het op één na hoogste gebouw van Zuid-Azië: het World Trade Centre.
Over de Westelijke Provincie
The Western Province is the most densely populated province of Sri Lanka. It is home to the legislative capital Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte as well to Colombo, the nation's administrative and business center. Western Province is divided into 3 main districts called Colombo (642 km²), Gampaha (1,386.6 km²) and Kalutara (1,606 km²) districts. As Sri Lanka's economic hub, all the major local and international corporations have their presence in the city and so do all the major designer and high street retailers, so be ready to indulge in some retail therapy in western province.
Having the highest population in the all the provinces, the almost all the premier educational institutions in the island are located in western province. Universities in the province include the University of Colombo, the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, University of Kelaniya, Open University, Sri Lanka, Buddhist and Pali University of Sri Lanka, General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University and University of Moratuwa .Western province has the largest amount of schools in the country, which includes National, Provincial, Private and International schools.