Pembroke Mall

Pembroke Mall
Location Virginia Beach, Virginia, United States
Coordinates 36°50′44″N 76°8′3.2″W / 36.84556°N 76.134222°W / 36.84556; -76.134222Coordinates: 36°50′44″N 76°8′3.2″W / 36.84556°N 76.134222°W / 36.84556; -76.134222
Address 4554 Virginia Beach Blvd
Opening date 1966
Management Pembroke Mall
No. of stores and services 100[1]
No. of anchor tenants 3[1]
Total retail floor area 623,479 square feet (57,923.1 m2)[1]
No. of floors 1
Website http://pembrokemall.com

Pembroke Mall is an enclosed shopping mall located in Virginia Beach, Virginia, United States. Opened in March 1966 as the first shopping mall in the Hampton Roads metro area,[2][3][4] it comprises more than 100 stores, including anchor stores Target, Kohl's, Sears and Stein Mart.

History

The site of Pembroke Mall was originally occupied by farm land.[4] Construction began on the mall in March 1965. A year later, the mall's first twenty-one stores opened to the public.[4] Sears and Miller & Rhoads, respectively the western and eastern anchor stores, opened shortly afterward.[4] Besides these two anchor stores, the mall also featured a Woolworth dime store near the middle.

A 1981 expansion added local department store Rices Nachmans as a third anchor store.[5] Four years later, Allentown, Pennsylvania-based Hess's acquired the Rices Nachmans chain and re-branded all stores as Hess's.

Miller & Rhoads closed its location at Pembroke Mall in 1990, and within a year, the former Miller & Rhoads space was replaced with Uptons, a chain based in Atlanta, Georgia. Hess's sold its Hampton Roads area stores to Proffitt's in 1993 and subsequently, Proffitt's sold all of its area stores to Dillard's in 1998.[6] Stein Mart was also added as an anchor next to Uptons in the mid-1990s.

By the mid-1990s, Pembroke Mall started to lose tenants, primarily to newer and larger malls in the area, including Lynnhaven Mall and Military Circle Mall.[4] In 1997, the entire Woolworth chain was shuttered, leaving a large vacancy in the mall, and two years later, Uptons closed as well, followed by Dillard's in 2002.[7]

Redevelopment

In 2003, the mall's management embarked on a mall-wide redevelopment. New floor tiles were laid throughout the entire concourse, and several restaurants opened on the periphery. Kohl's, a department store chain based in Wisconsin, opened its first Hampton Roads location in the former Uptons space that year.[8] Other additions included a food court in the mall's southern wing, as well as several national chain tenants, such as Pacific Sunwear and Hot Topic.[9] Freight Liquidators, a local furniture store, also briefly operated in the former Dillard's space. In 2006, most of the mall's northern wing (including the former Dillard's) was demolished.[2][3] The movie theater closed in 2011 (operations were concentrated to the nearby Regal Columbus Stadium 12), and it was torn down for a Target store which also took up the space of the former Dillard's.[10] The food court annex was torn down in 2012.[11] In 2013, the former food court became Old Navy and Coastal Edge (Old Navy is only accessible from the outside), and an Off Broadway Shoe Warehouse was added at the site of the former Woolworth's, restoring the original interior/exterior access.[12]

In 2015, it was announced that the Sears store would be downsized, with portions of it to be leased to Nordstrom Rack, The Fresh Market, and DSW Shoe Warehouse (the former two are now open, DSW will open soon). Only Sears is accessible from the mall interior. The detached Sears Automotive building will be replaced with a freestanding REI store.[13]

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Pembroke Mall leasing sheet" (PDF). Jones Lang LaSalle. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  2. 1 2 Batts, Jr., Battinto (2006-08-02). "Wing of Pembroke Mall will be razed for new stores". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  3. 1 2 Garrow, Hattie Brown (2007-03-22). "Pembroke Mall evolves with an eye on Town Center". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Stoughton, Stephanie (1995-11-06). "Pembroke Mall aging gracefully: Despite the proliferation of enclosed shopping malls in Hampton Roads, Pembroke Mall - the original - has managed to keep its edge by changing with the times and aggressively recruiting the tenants". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  5. ↑ Goldfarb, Greg (1994-07-31). "The dream is alive: Long-range plan to turn Pembroke area into gleaming central business district is turning into bricks and mortar". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  6. ↑ Stoughton, Stephanie (1997-01-12). "Dillard's prepares for regional battle where Proffitt's failed, Dillard believes it can flourish". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  7. ↑ Kimberlin, Joanne (2002-06-05). "Dillard's Is Latest Anchor Department Store to Desert Virginia Beach Mall.". The Virginian-Pilot. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  8. ↑ "Kohl's Brings Family Values to Virginia". Real Estate Review. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  9. ↑ Orr, Jennifer (December 2004). "A New Lease On Life: Pembroke Mall, Virginia Beach's first regional mall, is updated for the 21st century.". Shopping Center Business. Retrieved 2007-11-26.
  10. ↑ http://hamptonroads.com/2011/03/target-open-store-va-beachs-pembroke-mall
  11. ↑ http://wtkr.com/2012/06/06/two-more-national-retailers-to-join-target-at-pembroke-mall/
  12. ↑ http://www.chainstoreage.com/article/six-new-tenants-open-pembroke-mall-2013
  13. ↑ http://www.topix.com/forum/com/sears-holdings-corporation/TVRSV7PDLT2UEMNCF

External links

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