Here is a long-overdue update to the Post Oak Mall. Post Oak Mall was renovated 9 years ago, the last full post I did on the mall was over ten years ago. See which look you prefer. For me the old look was obviously better, the new renovation has not aged well at all. Photos taken in August 2021.
The former Bealls/Gordman's anchor which closed in 2020.
Macy's which closed in March 2021.
The view of the mall with the former Sears to the far right.
The former Sears anchor which closed on November 25, 2018.
Chuck E Cheese is at the left mall entrance.
About half of the former Sears has been taken over by Conn's Home Plus. The Conns opened in early 2021. It so strange to see the anchor halved with the old Sears and new Conn's.
Conn's with the Dillard's Womens store.
The mall map. This is a pretty sizable mall at nearly 800,000 square feet. Sadly 2 and a half anchors are empty. This directory had not been updated for a while. Sears is now Conn's Home Plus, Bealls is vacant, and Macy's is vacant as well. This directory is in the main mall corridor, we found a newer directory in a less travelled part of the mall.
The view of the mall from the Dillard's Womens store. As you can see, the mall looks very bland in comparison to the neon era.
Conn's mall entrance. A mall anchor with TV's is a rare sight in 2021.
Here is how the same anchor entrance looked in the neon era.
Headed back to the main mall corridor.
The hallway between Dillard's Womens Store and the former Macy's has the most chain stores.
A couple of examples of mall signage.
The food court looks nice. The light fixtures here break up the monotony of the rest of the mall. The food court is spacious but does not have a lot of food court tenants.
The former Beall's/Gordmans anchor space.
The JCPenney end of the mall.
And in 2011, the neon reflected off of the mirrored glass entrance.
A look from the entrance of JCPenney to the center court of the mall.
The same hallway in 2011.
The JCPenney corridor has always had quirky stores. Here are a couple of examples.
Heading back towards the food court of the mall.
The Dillard's Mens store which was originally a Wilsons/Service Merchandise.
The food court is located in the center of the mall. You can bypass the center court (Macy's corridor) through the food court. There are two hallways leading to the food court.
The Macy's leaving hasn't hurt this part of the mall. Forever 21 and H&M have kept the traffic going despite the loss of the anchor in this corner of the mall.
The empty Foley's/Macy's corridor.
Macy's has pretty much left all of the smaller cities in Texas including College Station. This store never had any major updates since opening. College Station is and has been an up and coming city so it did not make sense for Macy's to let this store fall apart and eventually close.
These comfy chairs in front of the old Macy's were really awesome.
The center point of the mall. If you look to the left, you can see JCPenney, to the right and you see the Dillard's Womens Store.
One more food court photo.
The same food court skylight in the 2011 neon era.
Heading back to the main mall corridor.
A few more photos of the mall as we head out.
I found you a t-shirt Anonymous in Houston, lol.
Casa Ole, these restaurants are becoming a rare sight these days, especially inside of malls.
This is a newer directory, but not updated to show the anchor vacancies. This directory is located in what seems to be a less travelled part of the mall across from the Casa Ole.
Shoe Department Encore which was also an Old Navy and Steve and Barrys.
One last look at the mall at the Dillard's Women store.
The 2011 version of the Dillard's entrance was so much better.
The retro customer service counter inside of Dillard's.
The Highway 6 roadsign.
One last look at the mall as we leave the property.
Let me know what you think about the changes at the mall in the comment section below. More to come!
I remember the post you did about Post Oak Mall all those years ago. While I did pull up that post to compare the photos in this post, it's also great having those old photos mixed in with the new ones. It's really interesting to see how the mall has changed. I agree that the mall looks less colorful and exciting now without the neon lighting. The new lighting doesn't look bad, but it doesn't have the vibrancy that the old lighting had. The old lighting reminds me a bit of the neon that was at the Mall of the Mainland.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the other stark difference is with the stores. Back in 2011, the mall still had big draws at the time like Sears and Macy's. Losing Sears is more about Sears' problems than the mall's, but losing Macy's is not a good sign. It's a shame too because the Macy's/Foley's had an interesting exterior design. It looks a lot like the Willowbrook Mall and West Oaks Mall Foley's that opened at the same time, but it's different in some ways as well.
I suppose Conn's is about as good of a replacement for Sears as one can get, but that mall entrance looks a bit strange with only one half of it being used. Hopefully the other half can be filled as well, but this mall has a lot of vacancies to fill. It's surprising to see Casa Ole still around. I remember when the Willowbrook Mall Casa Ole was seized for delinquent taxes many years ago. Casa Ole has seen better days in Houston, but I guess they're still going, strong or not, in College Station.
That vintage Dillard's service desk is pretty awesome. We didn't have Dillard's in Houston at the time that this store opened so it's a bit interesting to see those designs. I know Dillard's is known for keeping some vintage aspects around so it's neat to see that here.
You'd expect to see a lot of Aggies stuff at this mall, but rather there is ubiquitous Dallas Cowboys stuff instead. Ugh, lol. Given how they played on national TV this week, perhaps the media will finally calm down and give attention to teams who deserve the attention. Well, we can at least hope for that outcome, lol.
The mall did not feel very lively either, but maybe it was because we visited during the Summer. The neon was very similar to what we saw at Mall of the Mainland. If anything, they should have kept the food court or even the JCPenney corridor of the mall untouched. The colors they used for the mall are just not appealing.
DeleteThe Macy's exterior also looks identical to Deerbrook before the Ike damage renovation. If I remember correctly Corpus also has the same exterior. I guess this Macy's was out of the way since Temple and several midsized metro area Macy's stores closed.
The Sears corridor has been a mixed bag of stores and services. I don't remember seeing any chain stores down there besides the Shoe Department/Steve and Barrys/Old Navy space. Conn's does bring some life down there that was badly needed once Sears left. I wonder if the other half of the Sears space would even be desirable now since the mall entrance is mostly filled by Conn's.
Deerbrook Mall still has a Casa Ole, but I can't think of another mall that still has a Casa Ole in 2022 besides these two malls. Speaking of old Tex-Mex restaurants, Panchos is down to their last Houston area location. Humble is the last open Panchos in the area now.
This Dillard's store reminds me a lot of the Alexandria Mall Dillard's which looks to have been built in the same era as this store. I didn't get a lot of photos but there are some similar vintage elements in both stores. Dillard's is about 50/50 with their store renovations. The Houma Maison Blanche is one of the coolest examples of Dillard's keeping an old school look intact.
I figured you would get a laugh out of that t-shirt when I saw it. Your Giants are starting off really good this year and need to keep the momentum to keep up with Philly. I haven't seen much of the NFL the past couple of seasons though, so I don't know too much about what is going on like I did before.
Humble is certainly the epicenter for those who want to replicate the experience of eating cheap Tex-Mex in the 1980s. Not only do they still have the Casa Ole in Deerbrook Mall, but Pancho's and Monterey's Little Mexico are right around there as well. I didn't know that the Pancho's near Almeda Mall closed. Reading some of the user reviews of it, it does appear that Pancho's did intend on closing that location. Google still lists it as being open, but the last user review was from a month ago so, yeah, it's probably closed. That's a real shame because that was a very, very retro looking location on both the outside and especially the inside. I'm probably more sad about that Pancho's closing than I should be given how terrible their food is, but at the same time, Pancho's was a really big deal in Houston at one time so it's sad to see them down to one last location. Oh well, at least they aren't completely gone yet and the remaining location isn't that far from you.
DeleteThis is the best start the Giants have had in a very long time. I wasn't expecting a hot start, but I hope they can keep it going against Dallas on Monday Night Football. That'll make it much more tolerable to see all the Dallas Cowboys gear around town if the Giants can win, lol. Philly does look like the best team in the division right now though so I'm glad the Giants don't have to play them for a while.
There are a couple of retail updates from the NW side to mention. It appears Costco will be building a new store in Tomball at the corner of 249 and the Grand Parkway. That area is mostly empty at the current time, but there is an older Wal-Mart Supercenter on the old non-tollroad part of 249 near that. Also, it appears that Shoppers World, a small chain that's kind of like a Gordmans or Palais Royal, will be entering the Houston market with a location in the Jones Rd. & FM 1960 Steeplechase shopping center that Ollie's is in. In fact, it might be located right next to Ollie's, but I'm not positive about that yet. It'll be a few months before these stores open, but I am hearing that these stores will be opening probably at some point in 2023.
I think one thing that helps Humble out to keep these older restaurants is that the area does not have a bunch of the chains you find in other areas of Houston. Most of the chains that are there are spaced out far enough from Humble that people need to drive out to get to them. Chuy's and Pappasitos are in Humble proper, but Lupe Tortilla and Gringo's are a ten-minute drive away from Humble proper in different directions.
DeleteThe Giants are still looking good at 4-1 and they have to continue the good performances with the hot starts of Philly and Dallas. By the way, that Cowboys shirt is still on display at Post Oak Mall. Not much at that mall has changed by the way so I didn't do an update. I also made a return trip to the University Plaza/ University Mall in Nacogdoches, along with a visit to the Hometown Sears in Nacogdoches. Both of those visits will have posts. Going to a Sears at this point seems strange since they are so far away now.
Shoppers World sounds like a great addition to the area. I know they have some locations in anchor spots at older malls. Maybe they can fill the old Sears at Deerbrook and Willowbrook Malls. The 249 Tollway should be connected to Highway 105 soon which will give people a quicker route to Highway 6 and central Texas. It is no surprise that this area is booming, but it may come at a cost to the Willowbrook area unfortunately.
Sears closed November 18, 2018: https://theeagle.com/eedition/page-b007/page_0a4ea793-607b-5f56-b950-ccb053665675.html
ReplyDeleteAlso regarding Nacogdoches, the Walmart Neighborhood Market previously had a Kmart occupying the site: https://www.bluepageswiki.org/wiki/Kmart_9510
My bad, meant to say the Sears closed on the 25th
ReplyDeleteThanks for the date of the Sears closing.
DeleteI didn't know the Kmart at University Mall was a second location for the chain. It seems strange that the store would move to join the mall in a nearly identical sized space. The mall must have been the talk of the town back then and Kmart didn't want to be left behind.