July, 2006 - Labelscar: The Retail History Blog

Harrisburg Mall; Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Harrisburg Motel Phone Book and Bible

It was the fall of 2004, and I was finishing up my first day of what was then the longest trip that I’d taken alone. After a long day spent trawling across the northeast, I found myself standing in the lobby of a Red Roof Inn in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, entirely by myself in a city that I knew nothing about beyond that it was a) the capital city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and b) home of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant.

I knew full well that I’d spend the entire evening doing what I’d done all day–exploring the city and visiting malls–but something was strangely freeing about arriving in this strange city without a plan. My first stop was the Harrisburg Mall, just about a mile from my hotel.

At the time, I was going to seek out a place named the Harrisburg EAST Mall, but apparently the mall was in the middle of a major rebranding and renovation, and I stumbled into the center of it. Apparently the Harrisburg Mall (no “East” anymore), which is the largest enclosed shopping mall in metropolitan Harrisburg, hit some rocky times in the early ’00s. Anchored by Hecht’s, JCPenney, and Lord & Taylor until 2003 or so (though I think the Lord & Taylor may have once been a Hess’s), L&T pulled out of the mall as part of a larger round of closings. JCPenney and Hecht’s both announced their intention to leave soon after. The mall was sold, and management had to do something quickly to turn around the fortunes of the rapidly-emptying mall. Despite that the Harrisburg East Mall had been the area’s dominant mall quite recently, it seemed headed for a fast crash.

Thankfully, Lubert-Adler and Feldman Equities took a proactive approach to protecting the mall, which they detail in this case study. They renovated the two-level, 840,000 square-foot, 90-store center inside and out, introducing a rather Pottery Barn-esque design scheme, and convinced Hecht’s to stay on the property. The JCPenney space was quickly filled with a Boscov’s store, and the former Lord & Taylor was dramatically reworked to become a Bass Pro Shops, which today drives a large amount of traffic to the mall. In addition, a final phase of the mall’s renovation calls for the construction of a lifestyle-center-style streetscape to be built onto the front of the structure, creating space for additional outdoor retail. A movie theatre is also scheduled to be added to the rear of the mall, between Hecht’s and Boscov’s and presumably off of the food court wing.
When I visited in 2004, the mall had a surprising number of vacancies and Bass Pro Shops had not yet opened for business. As of a month ago, when I swung by again, the mall had rebounded dramatically and now boasts an 80% occupancy rate and seems to have reclaimed its role as the dominant mall for the Harrisburg area.

As you see from these pictures, Harrisburg Mall isn’t terribly exciting, bar its tall pylon or unrenovated basement court (the final picture). But it is an example of a mall that was quickly and strategically pulled out of an undeserved rapid nosedive and has been brought back to profitability. I wish all mall management companies were this stealthy.

For a vintage view, check out this 1988 shot of the mall’s parking lot! For a modern aerial view, check out this really neat-o black and white photo that shows the mall today, with the Harrisburg skyline in the background.

This is my sole photo from the 2004 trip. The fuzziness is arr-tistic, not simply a result of my old VGA-res style camera phone:

2004 image of Harrisburg Mall in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

And here’s some that are a bit more current, all taken July 2006:

Fort Henry Mall; Kingsport, Tennessee

All too often we profile the underdogs here. Malls that couldn’t make it get all the attention and some of the interesting, successful centers get lost in the fray. Sure, empty, dated corridors are great, but we aren’t being fair here and we never intended to punish those who are currently winning the game of capitalism. Besides, they’ll all eventually be history anyway, right?

Today’s entry comes to us from the Tri-Cities region of Tennessee and Virginia. With a population of nearly 500,000, the region is anchored by three cities: Kingsport, Bristol, and Johnson City. All three cities are in the northeast corner of Tennessee; however, Bristol is interestingly in both Tennessee and Virginia. Fort Henry Mall is located in Kingsport, which has a population of about 45,000. It is a successful two-level mall located on a prosperous strip and is nearly at capacity with stores. It’s currently anchored by JCPenney, Belk (2 locations) and Sears. One of the Belk locations was originally a Miller’s, a Hess’s, and most recently a Proffitt’s, which changed to Belk due to a buyout in March 2006.

Both the outside and inside of the mall are currently a hybrid of both very dated and modern decor, which unfortunately seem to be fighting and that’s not good. Outside, the anchors and most of the mall facade look ancient, which I think is cool but I’m sure puts off a few shoppers here and there. You know the type, they don’t walk into a place unless it’s glassy, shiny and sterile looking as a hospital. It appears, though, that Sears did update their logo with their very new logo. Going inside, the floors were dominated by pink tiles with purple borders, carpeting with a kaleidoscope of colors (none of which really matched), and peach colored railings. The ceiling was this mesh-looking latticework design, and sodium lamps hung down from it to light the mall (aided, thankfully, with some natural lighting and lighting from the stores). All in all, the design scheme inside the mall seemed somewhat schizophrenic and didn’t work at all for me. Maybe it works for you. For another strange color scheme, see my earlier Pekin Mall entry.

As for the mall this one destroyed, it was called Kingsport Mall, and was recently anchored by Montgomery Ward, Heilig Meyers, and Hills (later Ames). Talk about a sad destiny. All of those anchors went completely bankrupt and closed all stores in either 2001 or 2002. Needless to say, the Kingsport Mall, which never seemed to be on par with Fort Henry Mall in the first place, went down the tubes. In 2003 it was demolished and redeveloped into East Stone Commons, a very successful strip mall anchored by big box like Office Depot, PetsMart, Ross, Hobby Lobby, and Goody’s Family Clothing. It also has Cold Stone Creamery, which means it’s busy night and day. A tongue in cheek take on Kingsport featuring some of former Kingsport Mall’s pictures is featured here. Otherwise, check out my pictures of Fort Henry Mall featured below. They were taken August 2005.

Nashua Mall and Plaza; Nashua, New Hampshire

Nashua Mall logo from an old mall flyer, circa 2000-2001

Since this blog is sub-titled retail history, I figured that our inaugural mall from the Granite State might as well be, um, history.

The Nashua Mall was the first enclosed shopping mall built in New Hampshire, opening in 1969. The 350,000 square foot, 35-ish store, simply laid-out dumbell mall served for many years as the sole enclosed mall serving the city of Nashua, which sits on the Massachusetts state line. Originally, the mall itself hosted Woolco and Almy’s as anchor stores, and the sprawling outlots included a Montgomey Ward, a large plaza with (I think) a supermarket, Child World, and–probably built sometime later–a Shop ‘N Save/Hannaford supermarket.

There were some expected shifts, with the roster of anchors you see above: mainly that the Woolco became a Bradlees in the mid-1980s, Almy’s became a Burlington Coat Factory in the late 1980s, and the Montgomery Ward (which closed in 1997) became an Ames before that store also closed in 2002.

The Nashua Mall’s downfall was twofold:

It looked extremely old, because it clearly never received a significant face-lift during its entire lifetime. I wish I’d had the foresight to snap some pictures before it was too late, because the Nashua Mall was truly a gem. Despite that it was one straight-shot hallway, it was wide and with high ceilings, decorated with diagonal wood paneling and extremely groovy, dangling 1960s vintage light fixtures. The high ceilings employed an old Frank Lloyd Wright architectural trick (though I seriously doubt it was intentional) wherein there were dramatic changes in the ceiling elevation, causing some “low” areas broken by very “high” areas. Wright built this into many of his structures to cause people to move throughout the building, because lower ceilings in hallways and foyers encouraged people to move towards the more open central areas. Oh, there was also a beat up penny fountain in the center court, and Bradlees had a massive wall clock at the front of their store.
A change in demographics in the Nashua area. Unlike most malls that die, Nashua’s demographics improved as the city experienced a major development boom throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Included in this boom was the new Pheasant Lane Mall, a large two level mall constructed on Daniel Webster Highway on the state line on Nashua’s extreme south side. Because the New Hampshire border towns are a popular place to shop for Massachusetts residents due to the lack of sales tax, this mall would become widely popular and steal much of the business away from the Nashua Mall on the city’s northwest side. Similarly, the sprawling northwestern corner of Nashua also developed its own major commercial strip, but it was all located one exit to the north along route 101a, away from the Nashua Mall. With a population of 85,000 proper and many dense suburbs located nearby, Nashua could’ve easily continued to support two malls, but the Nashua Mall never received the necessary cosmetic love to make it viable.

Strangely, despite the mall’s horrendous condition, it soldiered on quite well until its death in the early 2000s and even included some mid-market tenants such as Brookstone and Cherry & Webb. The first major blow was when Bradlees closed with the entire chain in early 2001, leaving Burlington Coat Factory as the lone anchor. Kohl’s announced they would be taking the space, but they demolished the Bradlees building and built their own structure that was freestanding yet on roughly the same footprint. Not long after, the half of the mall closest to Burlington Coat Factory was shuttered and dramatically reworked to host a Christmas Tree Shop, which did also not have access to the mall. This left a small area of the original unrenovated enclosed mall for a couple of years. DeadMalls has some photos of it in this state.

This final portion of the mall would close in early 2004. The last of the mall was bigboxed, and the center today hosts Kohl’s, Christmas Tree Shops, Burlington Coat Factory, LL Bean, Home Depot, and Starbucks amongst its anchor stores. If you happen to be in the area, make sure to take note of the Burlington Coat Factory store, which is the last vestige of the original mall–the building is even still in the old Almy’s style!

Our friends over at From Woolworth to Wal-Mart have an even more complete history of the Nashua Mall, including a few more precise details than I’ve included here and some illustrative graphics to show how the mall used to look. The only truly original visual I have to offer up is the mall’s logo above–I scanned that off of a promotional flyer given out at the mall in 2000 or 2001. Despite the way it looks, it isn’t really *that* old!
Want to see something really strange? I’m not sure how long it will last, but if you load the Ask.com map page and zoom in and out intermittently, you can see the footprint of the mall before and after its conversion to a strip center!

And Here’s an old video of the Nashua Mall!

Garden City Shopping Centre; Winnipeg, Manitoba

I didn’t want Canada to feel left out, since they seem to actually have more malls than the United States (per capita anyway). Hey, it’s colder there. Anyway, Garden City Shopping Centre is an enclosed mall with 80 stores located on the northwest side of Winnipeg, Manitoba. It is approximately 30 years old, and anchored by major stores Sears, Canadian Tire, Winners, Petcetera, and Shoppers Drug Mart. It’s perfectly successful, and your average suburban mall in every way with one notable difference. It’s in Canada. Therefore, it’s automatically fascinating to a Yankee (like me) with an interest in chains, malls, and retail in general.

In order to begin comprehending how malls seem to work in Canada (and they do work differently), I’ll provide a very short primer here. While the enclosed mall is essentially the exact same thing that we have in the States (but with different stores, of course), Canadians seem to construct them more often. That is to say, their mall-per-capita ratio is higher than ours. What in the States would be a strip mall anchored by grocery, discount, or other, is often in Canada a fully enclosed mall. Sure, they have plenty of strip malls and even the latent big-box anchored behemoths (they often call them Power Centres), but they certainly have a lot of enclosed malls aimed at serving only a neighborhood contingent. Here in the States, most of our enclosed malls (with exceptions, of course) cater to at very least a regional, if not super-regional consumer base. In the States, it would be more odd to find an enclosed mall anchored by a grocery store or discount store and nothing else, whereas in Canada, it’s quite commonplace. That said, there seem to be a lot more enclosed malls in Canada per city or metro area because there actually are.

Winnipeg is no exception to this rule of thumb. There are no less than 10 enclosed malls of significant size within Winnipeg, which has a metro population of approximately 700,000. Compare that to similarly sized (or larger) metropolitan areas in the United States and you will mostly come up short. That’s just one of the reasons Canada is fascinating to me. I also enjoy it because it’s like an alternate reality or paradigm shift to the United States. Essentially things are done the same and the same types of things are available, with quirky differences to make it interesting. In retail this is exemplified in the fact that their chains are similar to ours, but not the same. They have chains of their own mall stores that are in every mall there, just like we do. But they’re different. It’s great.

I took these pictures in July 2001. If someone’s acutally reading this from Winnipeg, please comment away. I’ve never met any Canadians interested in malls and retailing in general, and it would be a great perspective from the other point of view.

South Forks Plaza (currently Grand Cities Mall); Grand Forks, North Dakota

Built in 1964, South Forks Plaza was Grand Forks, North Dakota’s first enclosed mall on a main commercial strip close to the center of town. In 1978, the Dayton Hudson Corporation opened a new mall, Columbia Mall, on the edge of town near the recently completed Interstate 29, linking Grand Forks north to Winnipeg, Canada and south to the rest of the United States. Quickly, Columbia Mall replaced South Forks Plaza as the destination for serious shoppers and the place for regional and national chain “mall stores”.

Since Columbia Mall took over, Grand Forks Plaza has been relegated to featuring mostly local stores and service establishments, drawing from a very local crowd. Its days of a regional or super-regional center have been over for a long time. Then, in 2001, another blow to the mall’s presence hit as Grand Forks Marketplace, a big box anchored strip mall, opened. It is anchored by SuperTarget, Best Buy, Lowe’s, Old Navy, Michaels, Bed Bath & Beyond, Gordman’s; Kohl’s and Menard’s are across the street.

In the early 2000s, South Forks Plaza’s owner, J Herzog and Sons of Denver, renamed the mall to Grand Cities Mall after the Grand Cities region of Grand Forks, East Grand Forks, MN, and other surrounding communities making up the immediate area. They hoped this rebranding would help the mall reposition itself as a retail destination for the micropolitan area despite the assault of Columbia Mall and Grand Forks Marketplace. Grand Cities Mall/South Forks Plaza has been anchored by K-Mart for years and it is the largest anchor at almost 100,000 square feet. The other anchor, Big Lots, flanks the other end of the mall, and a mix of mostly local but some national chain stores make up the mix of stores in Grand Cities Mall. It is worth noting that much of the space in the mall is taken by services such as a Karate studio, Century 21 Real Estate, a travel agent, a shoe shop, and even a ballet studio.

So why can’t the mall make it? Simply put, the demographics of Grand Forks and the immediate area cannot support two malls and a giant big box center. Grand Forks has a population of 50,000; however, J Herzog indicates the immediate area has 100,000 residents and the Grand Cities Mall has a potential to draw from a trade area of 300,000. Frankly, I’m not entirely sure where they get that number, as the population density in this largely agricultural area is very low. The nearest other cities of any significance are Fargo, which is 1 hour south, and Winnipeg, which is just over 2 hours north in Canuckistan. Grand Forks is the commercial center for the entire area in between Fargo and the Canadian border, but they’re clearly shopping at Columbia Mall and Grand Forks Marketplace, and not Grand Cities Mall.

I stepped into a time machine and entered South Forks Plaza in July 2001 and took these pictures. I was mostly fascinated and very truly amazed at how dated this mall was. It had clearly not been renovated in much capacity since opening in the mid 1960s. Many of the (dead) storefronts sported this western-themed, wooden facade which was complemented with bricks, and must have been popular then. Some of the light fixtures, flooring, and existing signage were also clearly original to the mall, which was amazing. Other parts of the indoor portion of the mall appeared to be under construction, and the developer’s website indicate a “renovation” of sorts took place in 2001. So, I’m not actually sure what the mall looks like today; however, it appears to still be open for business. Hopefully someone with some more knowledge of the area can enlighten us on the mall’s history and what it’s like today, 5 years after these pictures were taken.

Atrium Mall; Newton, Massachusetts

In general, most of the enclosed malls that survive in today’s marketplace are the big boys, the million-square-foot plus behemoths that can squeeze every retailer under the sun into a single building.

I’ve noticed one very notable exception to this, however. There seems to be a number of small, upscale, niche-oriented enclosed malls that thrive in upscale suburbs of large cities. Marketfair in Princeton, New Jersey; The Galleria at Mt. Lebanon outside Pittsburgh, PA, and this mall, Newton’s Atrium Mall, all fit that bill. I wrote about Atrium’s sister mall, The Mall at Chestnut Hill, a few days ago. This one, which opened much more recently (late ’80s or early ’90s) is right across the street, wedged into a triangular lot at the corner of Boylston St. and Florence St.

One thing that’s really strange about the Atrium Mall is that it’s essentially anchorless beyond an oddly-shaped Borders store, and that makes it feel far larger than its 205,000 square feet. It also stands four full levels, and is situated on such a small parcel of land that the entirety of the parking is tucked underneath the building in a very deep parking garage. As this is a pretty upscale center, they do offer valet parking, and there’s even a carwash located down on the valet level of the parking garage.

Beyond Borders, Atrium Mall is tenanted by the kinds of mid-to-high-end tenants you might expect to find, such as Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware, J. Crew, Abercrombie & Fitch, The Gap, and Anthropologie. There are also several sit-down restaurants, including local Vietnamese kitchen Pho Pasteur along with Bertucci’s and the Cheesecake Factory.

Because the mall is so small and vertical, there are no hallways, per se; instead the entire mall is organized around one large, central atrium (which makes sense) that’s shaped roughly like a grand piano. The architecture of the building (which is very unusual for a suburban mall) along with its relatively short sight lines make the Atrium Mall feel far larger and grander than you might expect. The drawbacks are the hassles involved with such an arrangement: having to park 4 levels deep and not being able to browse on a single level make browsing at the ol’ Atrium into a time consuming task. Still, I think part of this mall’s appeal, for many people living in the Chestnut Hill area, is that it’s always a bit less frantic and underpopulated than the large Natick Mall about eight miles to the west.

Perhaps the most interesting design element (and really, there are many) is the way the different levels don’t stack over one another exactly, allowing a scene like the one below, where Borders actually scoots out from under a mall level, allowing a view directly INTO the store:

Crossroads Mall; Fort Dodge, Iowa

Crossroads Mall is located on the south side of Fort Dodge, in north central Iowa, population 25,000. However, don’t let the seemingly small size fool you, because Fort Dodge is essentially the only population center for miles around. Of the nearest larger cities: Ames is 60 miles south, Des Moines is about 100 miles south, Waterloo is 100 miles east, and Sioux City is 120 miles to the west. According to J Herzog Inc, the mall’s owner, the mall draws from an immediate trade area of 117,000 and an extended trade area of 284,000 in a 60-mile radius. For hours in any direction there are nothing but mostly corn and soy fields on flat or gently rolling plains, dotted by the occasional one-horse town. As an aside, take a look at this interesting photo tour of Fort Dodge, including the mall. It shows many of the interesting things in the city, including the very old downtown. Like many cities established during the frontier and industrial heyday, Fort Dodge has experienced a significant decline and economic stagnation in recent years, complete with the problems of much larger cities like urban decay, poverty, and a downtown straight out of 1960. Despite this, it still remains a unique and interesting place and a close-knit midwestern community.

Crossroads Mall is a typical regional shopping center straight out of rural middle America in every way. Anchored by JCPenney, Sears, and Younkers, the mall also has about 50 other smaller stores including many national or regional chain retailers such as B. Dalton, Christopher and Banks, Foot Locker, FYE, Maurices, and Shoe Sensation, just to name a few. It contains about 480,000 square feet of retail space (including the anchors), making it a substantially sized enclosed mall.

I visited Crossroads Mall in April 2002 and took the pictures below. J Herzog indicates the mall was renovated when they acquired it in 2000; however, I saw almost no signs of this. The mall probably got a few new fixtures and a new coat of paint or something, because much of the infrastructure of the mall appeared to be at least 20-30 years old, if not more. As the mall draws from such a large area, it is mostly successful when you consider the demographics. You won’t find Banana Republic (or even the Gap) here, you’ll have to drive an hour down to Ames to find that. Instead, the stores here are more typical of a hard working-class, agricultural area. With lots of grandmas (keep reading).

On a more personal level, the mall amused me with endless randomness more than anything else. In the middle of the mall hallway was something that vaguely resembled a mailbox, but was instead for hearing aids. There were several errant hearing aids strewn about beneath the mailbox, indicating they missed their intended destination somehow, which was kind of odd (and gross). Strolling farther down the mall I noticed an unused kiosk that had a locked display. Behind the glass it was papered with flyers created in MS Word or something that exclaimed “Meet Grandma!” and had pictures of grandmothers grinning ear-to-ear followed underneath by the Grandmas’ complete descriptions, likes and dislikes, and what they do for fun (Casinos and doll collecting, anyone?). Inside the display case were apparently one of the Grandmas’ robes, some of their personal Grandma-accoutrements, a video (possibly about Grandmas, I don’t remember?), and a completely random cloth bag full of different colored tissue papers. I moved on. In another part of the mall, on the outside of what appeared to be a dead Walgreens store, was a handmade sign which simply read “Live Spiders” – needless to say I kept my distance from that. In the same vain there was another sign that randomly read “Coin toss” down a side hallway. Then there was the display of “vintage catalogs” strewn about a table in front of JCPenney, apparently in connection with their 100th anniversary that year. I started looking at them out of curiosity when an elderly JCPenney employee frantically waddled over and exclaimed, “Those are old catalogs! You can’t buy anything from them!” and I told her very politely I realized this and that I was just browsing them. She apparently didn’t hear what I said at all (or ignored me) and quickly said “I’ll get you a current catalog. Can’t buy anything out of those, they’re for display purposes only!” and she waddled off into the store somewhere. I almost said “Are you featured on the Grandma kiosk?” but decided against it and ducked out the side exit to the mall. I’m going to bet she turned in her hearing aid to that yellow mailbox a bit early. I just hope she didn’t miss…

Fremont Mall; Fremont, Nebraska

Fremont Mall opened in 1967 along East 23rd Street (Route 30) on the north side of Fremont, Nebraska. The enclosed mall isn’t very large at 227,000 square feet and serves the immediate Fremont area, drawing from an entirely local population. It is currently anchored by JCPenney and Gordman’s (A discount, uptrend big boxer much like Marshalls), with a recent addition by Hy Vee supermarket, a regional grocer based in Des Moines, Iowa. Fremont Mall is owned by Dial Properties, a midwest real-estate developer located in Omaha. Their site also contains a detailed profile of the mall’s site plan and demographics.

Both competition and proximity to Omaha keep Fremont Mall small and tidy. In fact, it’s somewhat surprising it makes it at all. The demographics of the Fremont Mall’s trade area and its proximity to the comparatively large Omaha metro area give hints as to why the mall isn’t larger. Fremont only has a population of 25,000 people and is fast becoming a bedroom community to greater Omaha. Downtown Omaha is almost 40 miles away; however, the western Omaha suburbs are less than 20 miles away. In addition, competition from the malls and retail strips in western Omaha clearly draw shoppers from the Fremont area who are seeking more value and variety than what is available locally.

Fremont Mall is organized as a straight shot hallway between anchors Gordmans and JCPenney. There are spaces for approximately 20 in-line stores between the anchors, and the space is approximately 75 percent leased. Despite the mall’s size, national and regional chains such as Bath and Body Works, The Buckle, Maurices, Claire’s, and Radio Shack complement local retailers in the mall. There is also a 4-screen movie theater.

Perhaps the most interesting feature of the mall to me personally is the logo still used by JCPenney. According to various sources, JCPenney switched from the logo you see here to their current logo in the early 1970s. So, since this mall opened in 1967, that probably means the “Penney’s” logo used here is original, which is pretty cool. This older logo was also in use recently at the Southroads Mall in Omaha and the Memorial Mall in Sheboygan, WI; however, both of those locations have closed within the past few years. As another personal aside, I think the older “Penney’s” logo is aesthetically better (and more striking) than their current one. The dark letters with the neon background make the turquoise P stand out and it looks great.

I took the pictures featured here on a very hot day in April 2002. Feel free to leave comments if you have more to add about Fremont Mall, and let us know if the Penney’s logo is still in use.

North Towne Mall; Rockford, Illinois

North Towne Mall was a hybrid enclosed-strip mall located at the corner of W. Riverside Blvd. and N Main St. on the north side of Rockford, Illinois. It opened in 1956 and at some point either a portion or the entire center was enclosed. Its main anchor was the Rockford-based department store Charles V. Weise and Company, which most people called Weise’s (pronounced why-zees). In 1982 Weise’s was bought out by Peoria-based Bergner’s and all the stores changed hands, including this one.

During the late 1980s and 1990s, when I was growing up just 30 minutes away from North Towne Mall. The small enclosed portion of North Towne at that point consisted of a portion that connected Bergner’s Department Store to the Kerasotes Theatres, and was parallel to W. Riverside Blvd. The rest of the center from the theatres all the way around the corner parallelling Main St. was a strip mall. Bergner’s closed in the early 1990s and moved across the river to Machesney Park Mall (which has seen better days itself). The empty Bergner’s was replaced during the late 1990s with local Gustafson’s Furniture, who did not renovate any of the inside space of the store whatsoever. It’s still open, and going in there is like going into a time warp. Imagine lots of dark woods, mirrors, various puke-colored carpeting, etc. I think they even left some of the fixtures up, and I know on some of the doors it still says “Employees only – P.A. Bergner & Co.” So that’s kind of cool.

Anyway, growing up 30 minutes away, we never once went to this mall as far as I can remember. We always went to either Machesney Park Mall across the river (which was very successful during the 1980s) or the much larger and ever-dominant two level CherryVale Mall on the southeast edge of town. I suppose that says something about what this mall had to offer. It never drew from a expansive radius and was more of a neighborhood center throughout its life. However, I do remember the TV commercials for North Towne Mall during the 80s and early 90s. The commercials marketed both North Towne and Colonial Village Mall, another small enclosed neighborhood mall in Rockford, in the same 30-second spot. We had occasionally gone to Colonial Village Mall to shop when I was little, because it had two anchors and more “destination” specialty shops, most of which were local. Colonial Village Mall was also decidedly more upmarket.

Since I saw the TV commercials for North Towne Mall and knew this mall was only half an hour away, I always wanted to see what it was like. We’d driven by a few times when I was a kid, but it wasn’t until I got my own car that I was able to go inside. When I finally went, it was almost too late. Gustafson’s, the local furniture store that had taken over the Bergner’s space, had spilled out into part of the enclosed portion of the mall. Alarmingly, not only were there no open stores in the enclosed portion, but there wasn’t a single one open. At the end with the theatres, there was this strange basement court that again contained no retail activity whatsoever. The theatres were accessible at the top of the basement court and were running discount movies. Past the theatres, the center regained consciousness as a somewhat successful strip mall that continued down a ways and then turned the corner to face N. Main St.

Considering none of the stores in the enclosed portion of the mall were open and the lights were off, it’s pretty much a no-brainer that it wouldn’t last long. But why did North Towne fail? Well, the simple answer is that it didn’t. It is still, and has always been successful as a decently large strip mall for the north Rockford area. However, the enclosed portion did fail, due mostly to the fact that it was not large enough to sustain itself as well as competition from the larger malls.

In Summer 2003 the small enclosed portion was demolished and, in line stores were put in its place. So now North Towne Mall is, in its entirety, a strip mall. However, both the Kerasotes Theatres and Gustafson’s Furniture remain open, as well as the stores in the strip portion. I took the pictures below in May 2002. Notice the poor lighting inside the enclosed part of the mall because all of the lights were off. It was actually much darker than these pictures suggest, because the camera compensated for the lack of light and exaggerated the light that was there from the exits and skylights. If anyone knows anything further about the history of this mall, feel free to leave comments or email me – it would be greatly appreciated.

Also, check out the mall’s rather rudimentary website.

The Mall at Chestnut Hill; Newton, Massachusetts

One of the common–and unsurprising–themes that I’ve observed in my travels to visit shopping malls throughout the country is that the most successful malls are often the ones that have had recent renovations, while the older ones are the ones that are flagging. If anything, this is the main reason why “dead malls” are somewhat more interesting than successful malls; they still maintain more of their history and mid-century architectural detail.

The Mall at Chestnut Hill in Newton, Massachusetts, is a huge exception to that rule. Unfortunately, it seems the renovation is finally coming after many years.

Despite the mall’s brutalist 1970s architecture and prodigious use of browns and oranges, this upscale mall has long served a higher-end wedge of Boston’s inner southwestern suburbs. Located at the junction of route 9 and the Hammond Pond Parkway on the Newton/Brookline city line, the mall serves as the centerpiece of the “Chestnut Hill” area, a vaguely defined inner ring suburb that encompases parts of Newton, Brookline, and even possibly a small piece of the city of Boston itself in the West Roxbury neighborhood. In addition to the Mall at Chestnut Hill, there is also another enclosed shopping mall, the Atrium Mall, located across the street.
The Mall at Chestnut Hill is a two-level dumbell-style mall that is relatively small for its design, with about half a million square feet of floor space. It has had a relatively stable roster of high-end tenants over the years. The mall has long been anchored by Filene’s and a Bloomingdale’s Mens and Home store. Surprisingly, the Bloomingdale’s store itself is not large enough to house all of the necessary departments, so the entire women’s department has always been exiled to a separate store located in an adjacent strip mall. The Chestnut Hill Mall Bloomingdale’s store is the only one in all of New England. Most of the rest of the tenants–Banana Republic, Crate & Barrel, etc.–are what you’d expect to find in a mall of this type. I used to define this mall as being “like a regular mall, except with FAO Schwarz and HMV instead of KB Toys and FYE.” Despite that both of those stores long ago vacated the mall, the comparison still holds up.

Unfortunately, it seems that the mall’s status as a 1970s holdout may be coming to an end. When I visited yesterday, parts of the mall (especially the center court and old penny fountain) were under construction, and it seems that the entire mall is getting a long overdue (but extremely disappointing) overhaul. Simon, the mall’s owner, has put together a PDF detailing some of the changes to take place, and it includes many “before” photos as well as an aerial shot of the mall. As a result of the Federated/May merger, the Filene’s store is being converted to Bloomingdale’s, and I’m not sure if this means that the off-mall women’s store is moving into the mall, or if Bloomingdale’s is vacating their current store and moving operations into the new store. It’s somewhat surprising that Federated didn’t open a Macy’s in the space, since no other Macy’s store exists nearby.
Despite the dated decor, The Mall at Chestnut Hill has always seemed quietly elegant, and it’s decor seemed more reminiscent of old PBS television shows than of anything truly derelict. It was a mixture of quaint and adventurous, but never dowdy. Let’s hope it stays that way, at least in part.

Thankfully, there are more pictures than just my own floating around on the web. Because this mall hosts an Apple Store, it means it’s also been the focus of the fervent Apple cult, a member of which took this set of photos when the store held its grand opening. This aerial photo also gives a sense of how close the mall is to the center of Boston.

Prangeway: I visited this mall with Caldor on August 24, 2001 and snapped the photos below. Note the feathered, brimmed hat character in a couple of the pictures. She became a running gag for us when describing the type of person who shops at this elite, upscale genre of retail center. Enjoy her and the mall from 5 years ago.