Weblog
Shuttered Harrod's, Buenos Aires
The shuttered Harrod's was originally affiliated with its London cousin, then became independent in the 1940s. The two Harrod's often fought legal trademark battles. The Buenos Aires store, in the Argentine capital's financial district, was closed in 1998.
RB photo, June 2008
Where Have The Downtown Stores Gone?
In a 1956 Time Magazine article, Allied Stores Chairman B. Earl Puckett related Allied's plans to invest $3 in its downtown facilities for every $1 it put into suburban centers. Puckett's forecast: "We doubt that more than 20-25% of our business will be in the suburban shopping centers."
By 1979, $77 out of every $100 in department stores sales came from shopping center department store branches.
Sources: TIME, 10/15/56. Erickson, Robert. The Grand Emporiums, The Illustrated History of America's Great Department Stores, 1979, p. 279. Photo from Allied Stores Corp. The World of Tomorrow, 1944.
Towers
A tower is a powerful architectural element that was used in several department store flagship designs. The most notable are Hudson's in Detroit and Daniels & Fisher in Denver.
J. L. Hudson in Detroit featured the tallest department store tower, 410 feet. Hudson's was the second largest department store building ever constructed - only Macy's Herald Square is larger. It also the largest building ever imploded.
Daniels & Fisher in Denver featured perhaps the most beautiful tower, rising 330 feet over 16th Street. Erected in 1911, the design of the Daniels & Fisher tower is based on the Campanile di San Marco in Venice. The D&F Tower was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River into the 1950s. The adjacent store was razed, but tower remains, narrowly escaping demolition in the 1970s.
Other notable department store towers:
Montgomery Ward Building in Chicago
Hugh O'Neill on Ladies Mile, Sixth Avenue in New York. Towers recently rebuilt.
Sibley's in Rochester. The associate newspaper was titled "Tower Talk".
Holiday Characters & Mascots
Maison Blanche, New Orleans - Mr. Bingle, a snow fairy Schuster's, Milwaukee - Billy the Brownie
Lipman's, Portland - Cinnamon Bear
Related: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeerwas created by the marketing department of Montgomery Ward, a character for the store's coloring book giveaway.
Unique Sale Names
Foley's, Houston - Red Apple Sale
Strawbridge & Clothier, Philadelphia - Clover Days
Discount Divisions
In the 1960s, many full-line department stores developed discount store divisions to compete in this expanding market. The list of discount siblings includes:
L. S. Ayres, Indianapolis - Ayr-way (1961-1980)
Dayton's, Minneapolis - Target (1962-present)
Lazarus - Gold Circle (1967-1988)
May Department Stores Co., St. Louis - Venture (1968-1998). May spun-off in 1989.
Federated - MainStreet (1983-1988)
Rich's, Atlanta - Richway (1968-1988)
Strawbridge & Clothier, Philadelphia - Clover (1969-1996)
Prange's, Sheboygan, WI - Prange Way (1965-1995). Prange's spun off in 1990.
Montgomery Ward spawned Jefferson Ward.
Caldor, founded in 1951 was acquired by Associated Dry Goods (ADG) in 1981; it became a division of May upon the 1986 merger, and was sold off in 1989.
Downtown Store Adaptive Reuse
Akron: O'Neil's was redeveloped in 1999 as a law office for Roetzel & Andress. See a photo here.
Birmingham: Loveman's of Alabama is now home to the McWane Science Center.
Cleveland: Halle Brothers and Higbee's have been redeveloped into office space.
Cincinnati: The Lofts at Shillito Place apartments have been developed in this former Federated store.
Denver: The former Joslin's store in downtown Denver is now a Courtyard by Marriott. The May D&F flagship on 16th Street is now part of the Adam's Mark Hotel.
Grand Rapids: The second Herpolsheimer's store in downtown Grand Rapids is now home to the city's police department.
Hartford: G. Fox redeveloped as offices, residences, retail and college classrooms, called 960 Main. Next door, the former Brown-Thomson store is now a Marriott Residence Inn.
Meridian, Mississippi: The former Marks Rothenberg store is now part of the city's arts center. The adjacent opera house was constructed by the half brothers who owned the department store.
New Orleans: Maison Blanche is now the Ritz Carlton.
New York City: B. Altman is a college library.
Philadelphia: The former Lit Brothers store is offices for Mellon Bank, with some ground floor retail and a basement food court.
Portland: The Lipman & Wolfe store closed in 1986, and reopened as the Fifth Avenue Suites Hotel in 1996. In 2007, the hotel was renamed Hotel Monaco.
Department Stores in Film & TV
Are You Being Served? was a Brit-com featuring a zany bunch of clerks, a stodgy floorwalker, a big-eared store manager and a womanizing septuagenarian store owner. The Grace Brothers set rarely went beyond the store's main floor, Mr. Granger's office and the storeworker's canteen.
Berrenger's - Short-lived 1985 primetime TV soap opera lasted just two months. Berrenger's was a fictional upscale New York department store.
The Drew Carey Show - Drew and friends worked in the fictional Winfield-Louder department store in Cleveland. The former Halle Brothers store was used for exterior shots of the store.
Friends - One of Rachel Green's (Jennifer Anniston) jobs is as an assistant buyer at Bloomingdale's.
Life with Father - 1939 Broadway play featured McCreery's department store.
Mannequin - 1987 film starring Andrew McCarthy and Kim Catrall as a mannequin who comes to life. The setting for the fictional Prince & Co.store is John Wanamaker's (now Macy's) in downtown Philadelphia.
Mary Tyler Moore - 1970s sitcom featured both Dayton's and Donaldson's on Nicollet in the show's opening. The most famous frames show Mary tossing her hat in the air in front of Donaldson's flagship. This scene is remembered with a statue on Nicollet Mall. In the show, Mary's neighbor Rhoda worked in the visual merchandising department at fictional Hempill's department store.
Miracle on 34th Street - Macy's and Gimbel's, Santa Claus...everybody knows this one.
Polar Express - 2004 film starring Tom Hanks and directed by Robert Zemeckis. In the beginning of the movie, the main character looks at a photo of himself on Santa's lap; the store name on the photo is Herpolsheimer's, the department store in Grand Rapids, which is the hometown of the author of the book Polar Express, Chris Van Allsberg.
Shopgirl - Sad Steve Martin/Claire Danes movie. Martin meets Danes character, Mirabelle, working in the glove department of Saks Fifth Avenue in Los Angeles. A relationship ensues, but then dies. The film was based upon a novella by Martin, in which Mirabelle works at Nieman Marcus. Saks negotiated their way into the film.