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The Dispatch wrote
Kaufmann’s at Polaris: Open-air center in progress
by Mike Pramik
Sunday, December 30, 2007
In July, Glimcher Realty Trust began tearing apart the former Kaufmann’s space at Polaris Fashion Place. The goal: Create a partially open-air lifestyle center that would be attached to the mall.
A section of the 130,000-square-foot Kaufmann’s building has been left standing, but most of the space will have an alfresco flavor. Hunt said no tenants have been signed, but the center will open in fall 2008.
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NO tenants yet? That seems a little ominous. You’d think they would have at least SOME major folks signed at this point.
If the conversion *IS* a big success, I wonder how long it’ll be until they start knocking down more of the enclosed mall to expand the outdoor bits?
Probably as soon as some of the other big anchors move out. There’s only a finite number of those stores and their population is shrinking. Smaller shops offer more flexibility.
I’m glad to see Polaris converting, but it doesn’t make me want to go there anymore than before. It’s a 45-minute round-trip drive from downtown (on a good day), an endless sea of parking lots around the mall, and for the most part the same stores you can find and every single other mall.
I’ll stick to near-downtown shopping for now with occasional trips to Easton and ordering stuff online if I really need to.
Oh, and there’s always Polaris South. 8)
…what is polaris south? I’ve never shopped in Grove City before.
There’s been a whole slew of strip mall and big box development along Stringtown Road (espeically east of 71) in the past few years.
WalMart, Best Buy, Target, Dick’s, Michael’s, Home Depot, TJ Maxx, Circuit City and a couple other large stores as well as just about every small store and fast food and casual restaurant you can imagine can be found down there.
There’s also been a whole slew of suburban-style development around the shopping area, and a new hotel just opened up as well (I think a Drury Inn).
Really the only thing missing is big dumb suburban-style mall and about 10 times the amount of traffic and it would be identical to Polaris.
If you look at this satellite map from a few years ago you’ll see a lot of dirt and fields and a handful of small homes. That’s not there anymore.
NO tenants yet? That seems a little ominous. You’d think they would have at least SOME major folks signed at this point.
If the conversion *IS* a big success, I wonder how long it’ll be until they start knocking down more of the enclosed mall to expand the outdoor bits?
i thought when Schakolad (sp?) left the Cap for the Hyde Park conversion they stated they were going to reopen in this new area. not a major tenant, but a possible tenant nonetheless.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
BY MARLA MATZER ROSE
Polaris Fashion Place will join the open-air trend in retailing this fall when the 8-year-old enclosed mall opens the first of two major sections of its “lifestyle center.”
Several of the tenants, including the already-open Cheesecake Factory restaurant, also can be found at nearby rival Easton Town Center. Other new dining venues will include Benihana and the Pub, an English-style pub concept that originated in Cincinnati.
Two retailers headed for Polaris’ lifestyle center that have garnered the most attention are Limited Brands’ Victoria’s Secret and Bath & Body Works. Other tenants will include Godfry’s menswear store, moving from the increasingly empty Worthington Square Mall, and Destination Maternity. The latter is a store-spa combination for pregnant women that brings together the retailers Motherhood Maternity, Mimi Maternity and Pea-in-a-Pod (the first two are now in the enclosed Polaris mall) with a spa offering services such as prenatal massage.
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Looks awesome.
Now if only we had a big, empty mall-like space close to downtown that could get the same treatment…
I can’t think of anything this city needs more than this.
exactly what is needed for city center but with a few more floors stacked on top to hold some office/residential. make town street ped access only as well as putting back a ped only part of pearl street from state to rich with a town center type fountain or something at the intersection. sorry to hijack this thread off of discussing polaris, but it is so hard to watch nothing happen at city center month after month when the solution we need is so obvious and seems to be occuring everywhere but downtown.
By GARTH BISHOP
Published: Thursday, October 30, 2008
With seven stores now open or set to open in the next few days, the new outdoor section of Polaris Fashion Place is moving forward at a rapid clip.
During the past few weeks, three additions to the mall’s open-air experience have opened their doors to customers: clothing stores Destination Maternity, New Balance and Godfrys.
The next store to open in the mall’s “lifestyle center” is Barnes & Noble, which was to make its debut today, Oct. 29. With the opening of the larger new store, the Barnes & Noble across the street at 1285 Polaris Parkway will close.
Two other businesses also are expected to open this week: Schakolad Chocolate Factory, which moves outside from a location inside the mall’s indoor section, and Ohio State University memorabilia store Buckeye Corner.
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Destination Maternity, New Balance, a larger Forever XXI, Barnes & Noble (which is moving from its far away location of across the street)and (gasp) Buckeye Corner… Is it just me or is this a pretty lame showing? I mean Easton’s newest additions are, Tiffanys, a revamped Henri Bendel and Burberry, …
The only thing going in that is at least noteworthy is our old neighbors, Schakolad Chocolate Factory.
I am quite unimpressed.
There will also be an Ohio Health Wellness center and some other great things. Godfreys turned out really nice. If you guys knew how much careful planning went into this project you would be very complimentary. It is an attractive redevelopment and great tenant mix.
I just wonder about the flexibility or longevity of traditional mall developments. They seem to be very cannibalistic.
I mean, I’m glad that Polaris is doing the open-air thing, and it should help them to survive longer, but I really think Tuttle is going to get hurt when the next big mall opens up on the north side of town (probably in Union county between Marysville and Muirfield somewhere). And it’s definitely not going to help Polaris.
When I close my eyes and imagine what Polaris Parkway will look like in 20-30 years, I imagine it won’t be much different than present day Morse Road.
There may have been “careful planning” in this one specific part of their development, but there’s a severe lack of planning all around it.