Chesterfield Towne Center - Busy but boring mall.

Chesterfield Towne Center - Thriving but …

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APOLOGIES: Mall is presently owned by Brookfield Properties. In my newspaper research this information did not appear to me and on Wikipedia in their detailed history which I was using newspapers to backup or detail. I saw management Brookfield Properties later in their sidebar but jumped over they were also owner. Newspapers don't show an article in Richmond of this change. My apologies for not catching this when video was compiled for upload. Brookfield Properties website shows it as one of their properties. I will strive to do better.

Chesterfield Towne Center opened August 28, 1975 as Chesterfield Mall. The mall developer was Southeastern Associates, which had developed malls in Danville and South Boston. The only anchor store at opening was a 100,000 sf Miller & Rhodes Store and they were spending a ton of money advertising all this store would offer the Public from all the newspaper ads I came across researching. It did have after all 80 departments. Costing $10 Million, the owners were stressing the natural look in its architecture and high quality merchandising.

The Natural look meant brick pavement in the main corridors instead of standard Terrazzo floors for example.

In it's initial years, traffic was slugglish. This lead to the nickname "Chesterfield Morgue."

In 1987 the mall went through an extensive renovation and was renamed Chesterfield Towne Center. The grand opening featured balloons, clowns, high-tech lasers and "Modeling mannequins" who moved robotically to the beat of Herb Alpert's "Diamonds are a Girls' best friend." This was to play into the new name and their diamond and palm tree theme.

The mall was transformed to something open and airy with palm and ficus trees, pyramid-shaped skylights and pastel hues. The expansion was a departure from the earth-toned Chesterfield Mall and the owners hoped this 100 Million dollar renovation would attract upscale, fashion-conscious shoppers from the affluent Midlothian and Bon Air Areas. They also invisioned this as a transistion from a floundering shopping center to the region's largest mall when additional phases were completed.

June 23, 2020 - Fight broke out in the food court between two men. One pulled a gun and opended fire. The wounded man was sent to hospital and later died.

#mall #busy #boring