Orange County Plaza facts for kids
Sign for Orange County Plaza in the late 1950s
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| Location | Garden Grove, California |
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| Coordinates | 33°47′22″N 117°57′51″W / 33.7893817°N 117.9642835°W |
| Address | 9635–9959 Chapman Avenue |
| Opening date | 1958 |
| Management | Donald H. Shanedling (original, 1958) |
| Owner | HGGA Promenade (Hughes Investments) |
| Architect | Jacobson, Coppedge & Huxley |
| No. of anchor tenants | 8 |
| Total retail floor area | 353,217 sq ft (32,814.9 m2) |
| No. of floors | 1 |
| Public transit access | OCTA bus routes 35, 54 |
| Website | https://www.commercialwest.com/garden-grove-ca-promenade-at-garden-grove-860-18000-sq-ft/ |
The Promenade at Garden Grove is a large shopping center in Garden Grove, California. It has had a few different names over the years, including Orange County Plaza and Garden Grove Mall. When it grew bigger in 1959, it became the largest shopping center in Orange County, with sixty stores. It was even called "Orange County's first regional shopping center," though another center had actually opened a few years earlier.
The Promenade is an outdoor shopping area located at Chapman Avenue and Brookhurst Street. Garden Grove is a city near Los Angeles, with many people living there.
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A Place to Shop and Hang Out
This shopping center has been a popular spot for people to shop and spend time for many years. It's a place where you can find different kinds of stores, from places to buy clothes to places to get groceries.
How It Started: The Early Years
Plans for the shopping center were first announced in 1956, and it was expected to cost about $10 million to build. Big stores like Penney's, Newberry's, and Grant's were planned to open there. A department store called Rankin's was also supposed to open a branch, but it never did.
The first part of the center opened in 1956 with 20 stores. It had about 60,000 square feet of shopping space. Some of the first stores included:
- Thriftimart supermarket
- Economart drugstore
Growing Bigger: More Stores Arrive
In 1959, the shopping center got much bigger with its second phase of construction. This added 40 more stores and a lot more shopping space, about 275,000 square feet. This expansion brought in some of the main "anchor" stores. Anchor stores are usually big, well-known stores that attract many shoppers to a mall or shopping center.
Some of the new anchor stores included:
- A large J.C. Penney store
- A W. T. Grant store, which sold many different kinds of items
- A Safeway supermarket, which moved from a nearby location
- A Thrifty Drug Store (which later became Rite Aid in 1998)
- A smaller department store called Hartfield's
A New Look: Renovations in the 70s
By 1979, the shopping center was known as Garden Grove Mall. It got a big makeover that cost $5 million. New anchor stores were added, like National Lumber. A new branch of Wineman's Department Store also opened that year. Wineman's later became part of Boston Stores in 1984.
Other popular places that opened during this renovation included:
- McDonald's
- Straw Hat Pizza
- Citizens Savings and Loan (a bank)
- Bank of America (another bank)
- See's Candies (a candy store)
At this time, the total shopping space was about 345,000 square feet.
The Promenade Today
Today, the shopping center is called The Promenade at Garden Grove. It still serves as a busy place for shopping. With over 353,000 square feet of space, it's considered a "community shopping center." This means it's a large local center that serves the needs of people living nearby.
Some of the main stores you can find there today include:
