The Daily Mall Reader: Desert Sky Mall

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Retailers shopping for new home at Desert Sky Mall"
Scottsdale Airpark grows as economic powerhouse

The Business Journal of Phoenix - July 27, 2001

(Excerpt) When Desert Sky Mall recently signed on Burlington Coat Factory as a new tenant, the West-side shopping center started drawing a flurry of interest from other retailers also seeking space, say officials.

The Burlington department store will take up the 92,000-square-foot space left vacant when Montgomery Ward closed last year, according to mall spokesman David Madrid. It is slated to open in October.

Desert Sky is a Westcor Shopping Center property.

Read the full article here.

Retro Mall Video: Metrocenter Mall

Phoenix, Arizona - circa 1990

Here's a quick peek inside Metrocenter Mall around 1990. The footage is short (and I wish more vintage), but still nice enough to take a look at.

Metrocenter Mall appeared in the movie, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989), as the "San Dimas Mall", and according to its Wikipedia entry, is the current location for the upcoming Universal Pictures film, Kids in America, starring Topher Grace. Here's more history:

"Metrocenter was a joint venture of Westcor, a regional shopping center development firm headed by a group of real estate investors and developers led by Russ 'Rusty' Lyon, Jr., and Homart Development Company, the real estate division of Sears, Roebuck and Company. The project was announced in November of 1970, the first site plans and artist renderings announced in the spring of 1972, and construction beginning in June 1972.

The mall was opened for business in October of 1973, and when it opened as the first two-level, five-anchor mall in the U.S., it was the largest shopping center in Arizona to date (housing more shopping space than the entire Phoenix metropolitan area had in 1957) and was considered one of the largest shopping centers in the United States."

Mall history: 1973 - present
Developer: Westcor & Homart Development Co.
Current website: here
Current aerial view
Info from Wikipedia
Previous entries: none

The Daily Mall Reader: Phoenix Spectrum Mall (Chris-Town)

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Aging malls get new life"
Creativity propelling rebirth of Spectrum

The Arizona Republic - May 14, 2003

(Excerpt) Chris-Town Mall was a retailing destination when it opened in 1961, one of the biggest shopping centers in the West and the first in Phoenix with air-conditioning.

Anchors included Korricks, JCPenney and Montgomery Ward. So many people showed up on opening day that one shopper remarked that it "looked like New York." More anchors came and went over the years, but the central Phoenix mall thrived.

Fast forward to today: The department stores are gone, replaced by Wal-Mart and Costco. Shoppers push carts down the mall's long corridors, and Chris-Town has a new name, Phoenix Spectrum Mall.

Read the full article here.