Sunrise Mall will soon be down to the last 4 tenants. Freedom Fitness, New Life Church, Planet Fitness, and Workforce Solutions. Wilcox Furniture closed in late 2020, and Burlington will leave the mall probably before the end of the year. Feb 4, 1981 was the date the mall officially opened and the last retail tenant will be gone in 2021. We will have to see what the future holds for the property, but things are looking very bleak.
This has got to be the most sketchy mall visit that I have done to date. It started out as a normal mall walk, but once nightfall hit things seemed to get weird.
We start our tour in the parking garage across from Burlington.
Broken glass, graffiti, and the smell of urine.
These windows aren't boarded up lets see what is inside.
The Burlington neon sign was still on casting a red glow to an empty mall.
The Workforce Solutions is still open, but they have an exterior entrance.
A left over Montgomery Ward sign still being used for Wilcox Furniture.
The old Montgomery Ward was split up between Freedom Fitness and Wilcox Furniture. Wilcox Furniture closed a few months after my visit.
Here is the mall entrance inside of Wilcox Furniture, unfortunately it was covered up.
The edge of the parking lot had a carnival going on. At this point in 2020, just about every event was being cancelled, and we were just a few days away from the partial lockdowns in the State of Texas.
More spooky shots
Inside of the former Mervyn's, this lone light shined. The other half of the building houses the Planet Fitness.
Another look into the empty corridors of the mall.
Sears still had their signage and some interior lights lit up.
Sears with Planet Fitness to the left.
Sears had only been closed just a few months before the visit.
I wonder if anyone used this coupon.
A peek inside of the store through the uncovered window.
A look at the entrance near Sears and New Life Church/former Stein Mart.
A flickering light shines at the creepy back dock of the Burlington Coat Factory.
The side view of the New Life Church.
As we now know, this Burlington will soon move into a new location officially ending the era of retail at Sunrise Mall.
One last look at the mall entrance with the Burlington neon glow and a completely dark mall building. To make matters worse, the parking lot lights were off as well.
More to come, stay tuned.
Thanks for the coverage, it's pretty sad to see one of my childhood malls in this state. I have a ton of memories of going into Mervyn's with my mom when I lived in Corpus. The mall logo you see above the upper level entrance to the food court was from the mid-late 80s (I remember seeing it as a kid in the mid-late 90s) and the mall logo by Workforce Solutions was from the early 2000s when they tried to revitalize the mall (the highway sign also got that logo too). Burlington will move across the street to Moore Plaza by the fall. While it might've been sketchy on your visit, I actually feel more sad than scared because I grew up going to this mall and there was so much the city could've done to save it but Corpus has no clue on how to handle retail operations.
ReplyDeleteThe 2000's logo looks very dated as well. I like the futuristic style look of the parking garage logo from the 80s better. Corpus doesn't have as much retail as I would expect to see in a city of its size. At least they have been able to keep one mall going strong, but I still think Sunrise is setup much better than the congested La Palmera.
DeleteThings here do look pretty sketchy. This place does have some Greenspoint Mall-like vibes just by looking at the photos, but even then at least Greenspoint does have some retail activity still going on at it. Unfortunately, it looks like the sunset has come for Corpus Christi's Sunrise Mall. That's too bad.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to see the relics of the closed Sears and Montgomery Ward. The Wards sign is especially neat. As for that Sears oil change coupon, $12 off does seem like a good deal. I'm sure that caught some people's attention until they realized they had to go to San Antonio to take advantage of the sale!
If Google Maps and the Sears Auto Center website are accurate, it seems that San Antonio still does have a couple of Sears Auto Centers open (8551 Wurzbach Rd has been renamed as a DieHard Auto Center) and the Town East Sears Auto Center in Mesquite still seems to be open. It's too bad Houston was not able to keep a Sears Auto Center of some kind for those who have warranties or lifetime alignments that were purchased from Sears. Aside from those three locations, the next closest Sears Auto Center to Houston is in Tampa, FL. I'm guessing someone from Houston isn't taking the trip there to get their tires rotated for free, lol.
The red glow of the Burlington sign looks very 1980s even if the Burlington isn't that old. Oh well, it's too bad all this retail has died at this mall, but at least you've been able to document some of the last moments for this mall.
The Burlington sign will go dark soon as well once that store leave. The timing of this visit at dusk was perfect. I should have gotten more photos of the Wilcox Furniture because they had a lot of neon signage. With the pandemic beginning to slow down business, they closed about an hour early so we had to leave.
DeleteI am very surprised that those Sears auto centers have stayed open. I would not want to be an employee knowing that at any moment they could be shut down. In a matter of a little more than a year, Sears went from having numerous locations across Texas to just one full sized store in El Paso.
The future of this property is certainly bleak. Only the 2 gyms, church, and Workforce Solutions will remain once Burlington leaves later this year.
Yikes - that does look quite sketchy and would make me nervous walking around there.
ReplyDeleteIt was definitely sketchy, I probably wouldn't be out there walking around much later than we were.
DeleteSo a new and rather strange update to the mall, it seems Bel Furniture took over the space occupied by Wilcox: https://www.furninfo.com/Furniture-Industry-News/14047/ why they felt the need to open a new store in a dead mall, I have no idea.
ReplyDeleteWorkforce Solutions closed earlier this year
ReplyDeleteThanks for the updates. I guess Bel Furniture got a good deal on the space. It doesn't sound like there is much of a plan for the property which is a shame. At least one anchor will come back to life for now. Workforce Solutions you could say was the last inline tenant even though they had an exterior entrance.
DeleteAnd now another tenant has moved into the mall!?: https://www.sunrisemallcc.com/little-woodrows-coming-soon
ReplyDeleteI really don't get what the city is planning on doing with the mall but it still doesn't make sense to have TWO tenants thinking they can revitalize a dead mall
That is such a strange thing for the mall. I wonder which space they will occupy there. If it is the space where the Chelsea Bar and Pub was, that is a terrible location. On the google listing, it shows the Sears auto center building extension which is a lot more visible to people.
DeleteThe longer the interior mall sits vacant, the more likely it will be that the mall will need to be demolished.
so now Freedom Fitness will be moving into the Sears spot (I also posted this on another Sunrise Mall post so just use this one instead): https://www.caller.com/story/news/2022/01/26/freedom-fitness-making-move-old-sears-sunrise-mall/9226248002/
DeleteThey really are going head-to-head with the competition. Planet Fitness is practically right next door to them now. It would be awesome if they reopened the mall as a running track. Ace's Adventures mentioned in his most recent video that he has permission to check out the Sunrise Mall, so we may soon see how things are looking inside of the mall.
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