The Auburn Mall, managed by

Simon Property Group Simon Property Group, Inc. is an American real estate investment trust that invests in shopping malls, outlet centers, and community/lifestyle centers. It is the largest owner of shopping malls in the United States and is headquartered in Indian ...

, which owns 56.1% of it, is an enclosed

shopping mall A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a large indoor shopping center, usually Anchor tenant, anchored by department stores. The term ''mall'' originally meant pedestrian zone, a pedestrian promenade with shops along it, but in the late 1960s, i ...

located on Route 12 in

Auburn, Massachusetts Auburn is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 16,889 at the 2020 census. History The Auburn area was first settled in 1714. On April 10, 1778, parts of Worcester, Sutton, Leicester and Oxford, Massac ...

, United States, near the intersection of the

Massachusetts Turnpike The Massachusetts Turnpike (colloquially the "Mass Pike" or "the Pike") is a controlled-access toll road that runs concurrently with Interstate 90 (I-90) in the U.S. state of Massachusetts. It the longest Interstate Highway in Massachu ...

(

Interstate 90 Interstate 90 (I-90) is an east–west transcontinental freeway and the longest Interstate Highway in the United States at . It begins in Seattle, Washington, and travels through the Pacific Northwest, Mountain states, Mountain West, Great Pla ...

) and I-290/ I-395. The mall features

Macy's Macy's is an American department store chain founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. The first store was located in Manhattan on Sixth Avenue between 13th and 14th Streets, south of the present-day flagship store at Herald Square on West 34 ...

as an anchor.

History

The mall was originally built in 1971 and featured Denholm's and

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co., commonly known as Sears ( ), is an American chain of department stores and online retailer founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosen ...

as anchors. Denholm's was converted to Forbes & Wallace, and later to The Outlet, a

Providence, Rhode Island Providence () is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Rhode Island, most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. The county seat of Providence County, Rhode Island, Providence County, it is o ...

–based department store chain. The Outlet store closed in the 1980s and was replaced with Caldor. The mall underwent a significant renovation in 1997 which added

Filene's Filene's was an American department store chain founded in 1881 by William Filene. The historic Filene's Department Store in the Downtown Crossing district of Boston, Massachusetts housed the flagship store and headquarters, while branch store ...

as a third anchor. Caldor closed in 1999 and was converted to a Filene's home store. In 2006, the two Filene's stores in the mall were both converted to Macy's. In October 2015, the mall unveiled plans to add a 10-screen cinema and restaurant in the space occupied by Macy's Home Store which closed on December 1, 2015. By April 2016, those plans were approved. However, in November 2016, the mall abandoned previous plans and proposed a new medical center for the Macy's Home Store space. On June 16, 2017, the mall announced that Reliant Medical Group signed a 20-year lease and opened in the space formerly occupied by Macy's Home Store on February 18, 2019. On November 7, 2019, it was announced that Sears would be closing on February 16, 2020, as part of a plan to close 96 stores nationwide which left Macy's as the only anchor left.

References

Shopping malls in Massachusetts Simon Property Group Buildings and structures in Auburn, Massachusetts Tourist attractions in Worcester County, Massachusetts Shopping malls established in 1971 {{US-mall-stub