We had such a great time last Saturday exploring the new Crosstown Concourse (also called the "vertical village"). The building used to be the home of a gigantic Sears store and distribution center. It's been vacant for several decades. Here's a bit of history on the building (pulled directly from their website):
The Sears, Roebuck & Company catalog order plant and retail store officially opened to much fanfare on August 27, 1927. It was the 14th Sears retail location in the country and welcomed almost 30,000 shoppers on its first day of business. More than 1,000 people were employed to staff the original 53,000 square-foot retail store and to process the 45,000 orders that came into the catalog center each day.
From 1927-1965, five separate additions to the original tower building expanded the facility to 1,500,000 square feet.
By 1993, Sears closes the Crosstown distribution center. The building is left vacant. As a result of the decline in the mail-order business, Sears begins to shut down warehouses across the country.
The Crosstown neighborhood is one of the city's most ethnically diverse and economically-challenged, but also includes a burgeoning creative community. After the building sat abandoned for 17 years, Crosstown Arts, a 501(c)3 non-profit, is formed (2010) to facilitate the redevelopment of the Sears Crosstown building using arts and culture as a catalyst for change.
The Crosstown Development Team announces commitments from eight local Founding Tenants in arts, education, and healthcare who will lease approximately 600,000 square feet of this historic property. In contrast to typical commercial real estate projects that fit tenants into generic spaces, the Crosstown Concourse founding partners participated in a collaborative planning and development process, resulting in a place distinctly well-suited to serve their operations and missions.
The renovations are amazing and we had the best time checking it all out. The new site hosts restaurants, health care clinics, a YMCA fitness facility, a new high school, apartments and much more. It's super cool to see what the city of Memphis has come together to do. Such an inspiration! Making this city an even cooler place to live! We LOVE Memphis!
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