The opening of the first Ikea Philippines store has been delayed until next year. 

The Swedish furniture and homewares chain cited “construction adjustments” as the reason for the delay, with Ikea Southeast Asia market development manager Georg Platzer reassuring ABS-CBN News the store was “taking great shape” nonetheless.

The debut Ikea Philippines shop – set to be the largest in the world when is complete – is under construction adjacent to the SM Mall of Asia in Pasay. 

“Whilst the building is taking great shape on the skyline, as can be the case with mega construction projects, the timeline is adjusted and firmed up as the project moves along,” Platzer told ABS-CBN. 

“There have been changes to the schedule and the opening date will be in 2021.” 

Ikea Philippines is building the store with two retail levels with three more floors to house a regional warehouse, a call centre and head office facilities to handle online sales. 

News of the 65,000sqm store was first revealed by Inside Retail Asia in April 2018. At the time, the largest Ikea store globally was in Seoul, a 59,000sqm space which opened in December 2014. 

With a product range of 9000 SKUs, the store will serve more than 5 million households located within a 60-minute drive as well as online shoppers.