Dick's Sporting Goods, also a part of the south side rebuild, opened at the same time.
Photo from www.centennial.com / Centennial Real Estate
Center Court in Connecticut's oldest shopping mall. Sears would be straight ahead in this view, with Macy's off to the left.
Photo from www.centennial.com / Centennial Real Estate
A corporate joint venture acquired the shopping hub in late 2015 and changed its name. It would be known, once again, as CONNECTICUT POST MALL.
Graphic from www.shopconnecticutpostmall.com
Much has changed by late 2018. The cinema megaplex has been rebranded on two occasions. It became a Rave (2010) and then Cinemark (2013) venue. Penney's pulled the plug on their store in 2017. It re-opened, under the Boscov's banner, in late 2018...just as the mall's 17-year-old Sears was pulling up stakes.
CONNECTICUT POST CENTER
Boston Post Road / US 1 and Interstate 95
Milford, Connecticut
Construction commenced on the
Nutmeg State's first shopping mall in November 1957. CONNECTICUT POST
CENTER was developed by New York City's Sol Atlas and designed by
Lathrop Douglass, also of New York City, and Milford's Jesse James
Hamblin. The open-air facility was constructed on a 75 acre parcel,
located 6 miles southwest of downtown New Haven, in suburban Milford.
The site was adjacent to a
newly-completed segment of the Connecticut Turnpike (Interstate 95). The
500,000 square foot retail complex, hailed as the largest between New
York City and Boston, consisted of a single level of retail with a
service basement beneath.
On
September 14, 1960, the first stores in the 30 million dollar venue
opened for business. The grand opening commenced at 7 pm and extended
into the night. It included fireworks, a parade, dancing, fashion shows,
concerts and appearances by several dignitaries.
Fifty stores and services would
eventually be housed in CONNECTICUT POST CENTER. These included County
Hardware, Franklin-Simon, Kennedy's of New England, a W.T. Grant variety
store, S.S. Kresge 5 & 10, Bradlees "suburban self-service
department store" and Stop & Shop supermarket.
New York City-based Alexander's
opened a 3-level (155,000 square foot) anchor store on August 21, 1962.
This was the sixth unit in the chain and the first outside the New York
City metropolitan area. The General Cinema Corporation Milford Cinema was built as a southwest parking lot outparcel. The single-screen venue was officially dedicated April 2, 1965.
TRUMBULL SHOPPING PARK {5 miles
west, in Trumbull} became the first retail competitor, in 1964. This was
followed by CHAPEL SQUARE, New Haven's downtown redevelopment
shopping center, which was completed in 1967.
By the early 1970s, several charter
tenants at CONNECTICUT POST CENTER had closed. The shopping hub now
housed stores such as Giftique, Lynn's Hallmark, Whelan Drug, Friendly
Frost Appliances and a Hill's supermarket. The Post Mini-Mall contained twelve boutique-type stores.
A fire spread through the south end
of the complex in May 1976. The Hills supermarket, Lynn's Hallmark and
W.J. Sloan furniture store were destroyed. The area was rebuilt as a
2-level (86,000 square foot) Caldor discount mart. The 27th store in the
Norwalk, Connecticut-based chain, it opened for business April 27,
1977.
The open shopping concourse had been
fitted with a SkyShield type of (partial) enclosure in the late 1970s.
This afforded some protection from the elements, but did not provide for
heating or air-conditioning of the space. In
1981, Australia-based Westfield acquired the complex and renovated it
into a fully-enclosed and climate-controlled facility. It was promoted
as CONNECTICUT POST MALL, but the local populace continued to refer to it as "Milford Mall."
Alexander's became the first of the
original anchors to close, in 1988. This store re-opened as a J.C.
Penney on August 7, 1991. At the time, the shopping center was
undergoing a third renovation and expansion, to the tune of 75 million
dollars. A 2-level (150,000 square foot), Hartford-based G. Fox was
built. It opened in 1991 and was rebranded, by Boston-based Filene's, on
February 1, 1993.
In the following year, the basement
at CONNECTICUT POST MALL was refitted as a second retail concourse
(Level I). In addition, the Sky View Food Court was installed on a
newly-constructed third floor. The official name of the complex was
changed to WESTFIELD SHOPPINGTOWN CONNECTICUT POST in November 1998. The
mall encompassed 777,000 leasable square feet and housed 132 stores and
services.
The Stop & Shop supermarket
moved to a freestanding location. Its store on the north end of the mall
was razed. A 2-level (178,000 square foot) Sears took its place and
opened for business on April 1, 2000. Caldor
had been shuttered on May 15, 1999. The vacant store provided the
impetus for a major redevelopment of the south end of the center. A
groundbreaking was held October 12, 2004.
Target was dedicated on March 1, 2006, with the Showcase Cinema de Lux 14 showing its first features on March 10th. At the same time, a third level (consisting of 75,000 square feet) was added to Filene's. The store, now encompassing 225,000 square feet, was rebranded by Macy's on September 9, 2006.
Now officially known as WESTFIELD CONNECTICUT POST, the shopping complex encompassed 1,334,000 leasable square feet and housed over 150 stores and services. The Cinema de Lux 14 was rebranded as the Rave Motion Pictures Connecticut Post 14 in May 2010. In November of the same year, one of its auditoriums re-opened as an IMAX theater. In June 2013, the venue was rebranded under the Cinemark banner.
Westfield sold the shopping hub in December 2015. It was acquired by a joint venture of San Antonio's USAA Real Estate, Dallas' Centennial Real Estate and San Francisco's Montgomery Street Partners. Its official name soon reverted back to CONNECTICUT POST MALL.
J.C. Penney announced the shuttering of 120 mall-based stores in March 2017. The CONNECTICUT POST location, in business as a Penney's for nearly 25 years, went dark on July 31, 2017. Reading, Pennsylvania's Boscov's chain expanded the vacant store from 155,000 to 200,000 square feet and opened for business on October 4, 2018.
Sources:
The Bridgeport Sunday Post (Bridgeport, Connecticut)
The Bridgeport Sunday Herald (Bridgeport, Connecticut)
The New Haven Register (New Haven, Connecticut)
www.contact.com / "Keys To The Highway" / Melissa Nicefaro / July 8, 2002
www.fusco.com / Fusco Construction
Assessor's Online Database For Milford County
www.associatedcontent.com / "Cinema de Lux Key Feature In New Mall Addition" / Posted by Corey Sipe / August 15, 2006
www.westfield.com / The Westfield Group
www.centennial.com / Centennial Real Estate
"Filene's" article on Wikipedia
