Washington Crown Center facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
Washington Crown Center

Location	Washington, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Coordinates	40°9′34″N 80°16′34″W
Address	1500 West Chestnut Street
Opening date	1969
Developer	Crown American
Owner	Kohan Retail Investment Group
No. of stores and services	45
No. of anchor tenants	8 (4 open, 6 vacant before April, 2021)
Total retail floor area	676,136 square feet (63,000 m2)
No. of floors	1

Washington Crown Center (formerly Franklin Mall) is a 676,000 square-foot regional enclosed shopping mall in North Franklin Township, Washington County, Pennsylvania, just outside the city of Washington and south of Pittsburgh. The mall's anchor stores are Marshalls, Ross Dress for Less, Rural King, and Jo-Ann Fabrics. There are four vacant anchor stores that were once Sears, Macy's, The Bon-Ton, and Hollywood Theaters.

History

The mall opened in 1969 as Franklin Mall, with Troutman's, Sears and Grant City (which became Hills in 1976) as its anchors.

In 1999, the mall was renamed Washington Crown Center and underwent a renovation. while Kaufmann's was converted to Macy's in 2006. In 2013, Marshalls replaced Old Navy. In 2014, Ross Dress for Less took 25,000 square feet of former specialty retail shop space. The trend of replacing small shops with big box stores continued through 2014 with the addition of Jo-Ann Fabrics, Ulta, and Books-a-Million. In January 2015, PREIT announced that it was planning on selling Washington Crown Center along with four other malls.

In August 2016, PREIT sold the Mall for $20 million. It was reported that the occupancy had dropped to 87.4% before the sale and had represented a drop in performance. Macy’s and Gander Mountain closed in 2017. Gander Mountain would be replaced by Rural King in May 2018. The Bon-Ton closed all locations by August 2018. On August 31, 2019, it was announced that Sears would be closing this location a part of a plan to close 92 stores nationwide. The store closed on December 15, 2019. This was the last remaining Sears store in western Pennsylvania (not counting Sears Hometown and Outlet Stores).

On October 3, 2020, Hollywood Theaters announced it would be closing all of their locations permanently due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This left Rural King, Marshalls, Jo-Ann Stores, and Ross Dress for Less as the mall's only anchor stores. Ulta Beauty is expected to move out to a nearby shopping center in April 2021. Ross Dress for Less is expected to close on January 19, 2021. This will leave Marshall's and Rural King as the only anchors.