Southland Center, Taylor, Michigan

One of Southland Center's two marquee pylon signs. This one is located at the southeast entrance, the other pylon sign may be seen in the background to the right. The center, the last of Detroit's "Land" malls, is currently anchored by Macy's, JCPenney and Best Buy.

Many metropolitan areas have at least one area that's ignored a lot and Metro Detroit is no exception. In this case, that area is called "Downriver." It is a collection of 18 Wayne County communities that are located south and southwest of Detroit, extending down from that city to the Monroe County line. It's history almost parallels Detroit's, like it's major city, Downriver was a major area of French settlement in the 18th century. Today, Downriver is unlike anywhere else in the region, which transitions from the oldest houses in River Rouge, Wyandotte and Trenton to the postwar tract homes in Allen Park, Southgate and Taylor to the rural-ness of Romulus and Flat Rock. However, even though many Metro Detroiters often ignore Downriver, it has some things not seen anywhere else in the area, including the Detroit Lions practice facility in Allen Park and Detroit Metro Airport in Romulus.

Surprisingly, though, only one regional mall exists within this cavalcade of communities. And for our first actual post, this is exactly what we're talking about. Southland Center was the last of Metro Detroit's four "land" malls that were developed by famous mall architect Victor Gruen and Detroit stalwart JL Hudson. The first was Northland in Southfield in 1954, followed by Eastland in Harper Woods in 1957 and Westland in Westland (duh!) in 1965.

In the late 1960's, a plot of land along the north side of Eureka Road exactly halfway between the recently-completed Interstate 75 highway and Telegraph Road (US Highway 24) in the southeast side of the newly-incorporated City of Taylor was set aside for the last of those malls. Gruen, Louis G. Redstone and the newly-formed Dayton-Hudson Corporation (following a merger of Hudson's and Minneapolis mercantile Dayton's) began construction on Southland Center, which then opened (to fanfare) on July 20, 1970. At opening, it was anchored by a three-level, 292,000 square-foot Hudson's store (with an attached Hudson's Budget Store off the east court), a Woolworth 5-and-10 across from Hudson's on the east court and a Kroger supermarket just east of the Budget Store. In addition, a two-screen theatrical venue operated by locally-based Suburban Detroit Theaters opened just off the intersection of the center and west courts.

An aerial photo of Southland Center taken shortly after opening. Hudson's is at the center, the theaters are just below Hudson's and Kroger is just above Hudson's.

The first expansion took place in 1976, after Kroger relocated across Eureka Road and the Southland location was shuttered. The old Kroger store was gutted into smaller store spaces. In addition, a new wing that was attached to the newly-divided former supermarket was constructed and ended in a two-level, 215,000 square-foot JCPenney store.

Southland Center as it appears today.

Next, sometime during the early 1980's, both auditoriums in the theaters were divided, creating a total of four screens. Afterwards, in 1986, AMC Theaters, in a quick entry into the Detroit area, acquired Suburban Detroit and the theaters were now known as the AMC Southland 4 Theaters. During this time, many big-box stores, strip malls and restaurants were constructed surrounding Southland Center, including Burlington Coat Factory, Target (which was, ironically, also owned by the Dayton-Hudson Corporation), Art Van Furniture, Meijer, Kohl's, Babies "R" Us, Media Play, Petsmart, Belle Tire, Mountain Jack's, Discount Tire, Petco and Circuit City.

Only two years later, Southland Center was acquired by the Rouse Company, also, a new 75,000 square-foot Dayton-Hudson-owned Mervyn's was built on the west side of the mall.

Throughout it's existence, Southland Center has been the only true regional mall to be located in suburban Wayne County south of Interstate 94. The nearest competitors are Southgate Shopping Center (Southgate, 3 miles east), Fairlane Town Center (Dearborn, 8 miles north-northeast), Westborn Mall (Dearborn, 7 miles north) and The Mall of Monroe (Frenchtown Township, 19 miles south-southwest).

Another expansion took place in 1992. In this expansion, a triangular-shaped food court named The Picnic Garden was added on and featured a large skylight (which has since become a local landmark), palm trees, restaurants such as McDonald's (which featured a dinosaur-themed mural!), Taco Bell (their second location in the mall) and Sbarro, two fountains at the northern end, a new store space (presently occupied by New York & Company) and an expanded store space (presently occupied by Champs Sports).

Five years later, in July 1997, the entire Woolworth chain went out of business and shuttered all of their remaining stores, including the Southland location. It's space was divided into three different stores, now occupied by (from north to south) Pacsun, Justice and Buckle. Just two years later, in January 1999, the AMC Southland 4 permanently closed after it had declining attendance due to the opening of the Star Taylor 10 across Eureka Road (ironically, that too would later be owned by AMC after it acquired Star owner Loews Theaters in 2006 and would own it until 2009, then it sat vacant for a year until reopening as the Spotlight Taylor 10, which then closed (again!) in October 2012 and is now vacant currently).

Southland Center entered the new millennium with a new tenant and another with a renamed owner. Ann Arbor-based Borders Books & Music opened in the former AMC Southland 4 sometime in the year 2000 and in January 2000, the Dayton-Hudson Corporation was renamed the Target Corporation after their profitable discount store division. Just a year later, in 2001, Target decided to consolidate all three of the high-end department store chains they owned at the time under one banner and Chicago-based Marshall Field's was chosen because it was the most recognizable of the three. As a result, after 31 years as Hudson's, Southland Center's location became a Marshall Field's.

In 2004, more ownership changes took place as the Target Corporation decided to focus only on their Target stores and sold Marshall Field's to May Department Stores and Mervyn's to Sun Capital Partners. That same year, General Growth Properties acquired the Rouse Company and all of Rouse's properties were now owned by GGP, including Southland Center.

Two years later, major changes took place at Southland Center. In February 2006, Mervyn's decided to completely pull out of Michigan and closed their Southland store, to this date, it has yet to be re-tenanted. In September of that year, May Department Stores was acquired by Federated Department Stores and all May-owned stores, including Marshall Field's, were rebranded to the famed New York store Macy's. Picnic Garden was demolished (though the fountains and skylight were saved) to make room for a Best Buy store (which would result in the shuttering of their Southgate location, that store was since then torn down for a Walmart) and a few restaurants, including Sbarro, Subway and a Dairy Queen/Orange Julius combo, relocated elsewhere in the mall (Sbarro to the Borders wing, Subway to the former Mervyn's wing and DQ/OJ to an east court kiosk) while others, such as McDonald's and Taco Bell, disappeared completely from the mall.

The Picnic Garden skylight was worked into the Best Buy, which opened in late 2006. In April 2009, GGP declared bankruptcy in what was the largest retail real estate bankruptcy in American history and many of their properties, including Southland Center, also filed for bankruptcy. Also around this time, there were rumors that Southland Center may close, though those rumors were eventually revealed to be fake.

Despite the bankruptcy, Southland Center continued to serve Downriver residents, but in 2011, Borders announced that they would be going out of business and the Southland store was shuttered in September of that year. A short time later, in December 2011, the release of new Air Jordan shoes resulted in rioting at Southland Center. One month later, GGP sold Southland Center and 30 other of their properties to a newly-created spinoff called Rouse Properties, who still owns Southland today.

During Rouse Properties' one-plus-year ownership of Southland Center, it has planned major overhauls. For example, in the fall of 2012, four new youth-friendly tenants opened, namely Dinky Donuts, rue21, Taco Bell's third location in Southland and Torrid. In fact, more is in the works at Southland Center. This spring, Forever 21 will relocate from a smaller store on the corridor connecting the court area and Best Buy to the space formerly occupied by the theaters and Borders.

Have any memories you want to share about Southland Center, especially those relating to Hudson's, the theaters and Picnic Garden? Feel free to share them in the comments section, which follows these photos. And do you also remember any former inline stores at Southland Center?

Southland Music Center, which is located next to the southeast entrance along the corridor to the JCPenney court. This was formerly a Burger King.

JCPenney's mall entrance. The facade appears it may date back to the store's 1976 opening, look at that wood surrounding the 1971-2011 logo!

The interior of JCPenney. This was taken on the first level. It was recently renovated in July-August 2012.

Looking from JCPenney into Southland Center.

rue21, a recent addition to Southland Center.

This vacant storefront in the corridor connecting JCPenney to the court area was most recently Man Alive.

Detroit Glitz, one of a handful of Southland-exclusive stores, is located down the same corridor.

Looking east on the same corridor (again). To the left is Top Line, another Southland-exclusive store which replaced a Sprint retailer, to the right is Pearle Vision.

Claire's Accessories, one of the many national chains located in Southland Center. This one is across from the Macy's men's department entrance.

Macy's men's department entrance. This was formerly Hudson's Budget Store. If you look carefully past the entrance, you can notice green carpet, likely a remnant from the Budget Store or Marshall Field's era.

Macy's east court entrance.

Justice occupies one of the three store spaces that were carved out of Woolworth when that chain closed in 1997. The other two are occupied by Buckle and Pacsun.

Forever 21 currently occupies this space along the corridor connecting Best Buy to the court area. In the spring, it will relocate to the theaters/Borders space.

Best Buy's mall entrance. This is one of only a handful of Best Buy stores with mall entrances, several others are in the New England area, those were formerly Filene's stores and another such store is at the Mall of America in Best Buy's home state of Minnesota.

The Best Buy is unique in that it has a towering skylight (actually a remnant from the Picnic Garden food court). Because of this, the store is a perfect contender for the Most Unique Big Box Stores (if such a list exists).

This appears to have been formerly Hudson's center court entrance until the 1990's, when several store spaces were constructed (including Mrs. Field's Cookies, seen at the bottom), narrowing the center court in the process.

Macy's west court entrance.

After this wall comes down, it will reveal a larger Forever 21 store. This was where the theaters and later Borders were.

Taco Bell's first Southland Center location was in the west court space currently occupied by Charlotte Russe.

This sign inside Macy's is a remnant from the Hudson's years, since it uses the same font used on Hudson's most recent logo.

The interior of Macy's.