King of Prussia Mall: First Visit Post-Expansion

Inside the expansion itself. This part of the mall is almost entirely designer stores, a few of which (Gucci, Cartier, Louis Vuitton, etc) relocated from the part of the mall formerly known as the Plaza. The different names for the different mall buildings was scrapped when this expansion connected them all into one. The expansion also contains the mall's 4th food court (The original food court, the 90's Plaza food court, and the food court in the former Strawbridge's are the other ones). 

Neiman Marcus was built on the mall in the 90's. It's not a new tenant, it just has a new entrance.

The expansion, looking towards the original mall. The expansion is a little higher up because there's a parking deck beneath it, which probably wouldn't have been up to regulation height if they lined this up with the Plaza's floor.

This is in the one of the older parts of the mall, just inside the expansion. I think this part was probably added on in the 70's.

 The now-closed JCPenney, which was the last remaining tenant from when the mall first opened in 1965. Even though they had part of the mall since the beginning, this wasn't their original location. They moved to this space after Gimbel's, the previous tenant, closed. Their old location still stands, but has been carved up into mall space and is unidentifiable from the inside.

The space currently sits vacant. I'm assuming it will be torn down like the old Wanamaker's store whenever they find a new use for this space. Maybe they'll use it for another mall expansion. :P

 Even a luxury mall like KOP has an As Seen on TV store. I don't remember what this was before, but ASTV have been here a surprisingly long time.

 The mall's obligatory Payless store. I could have sworn there were two Paylesses in the mall, but this is the only one showing up on their store locator.

Primark was originally the first floor of Sears, which opened in 1983. It was downsized to just the first floor in 2014, allowing Dick's to open up above it. Even though Sears was still doing well here, Seritage (which owns the Sears building; Simon owns the rest of the mall) decided they would rather have a more upscale tenant. Sears was kicked out less than a year after they remodeled, and replaced with Primark's first US store.

 Looking towards the RadioShack, which (as you've probably guessed, or if you've been following me long enough have already seen) is closed now. Knowing this mall, I'm sure it won't be empty for long.

 While the food court itself was remodeled somewhat recently, they didn't redo all the restaurants. Canton here was a little stuck in the 90's. That didn't stop me from getting dinner here, though!

 Tony Luke's, a South Philly chain of cheesesteak eateries. They mostly are located around here, mainly in malls and stadiums. They also have a few outside the ares: one in Houston, TX; one in the Pentagon; and another opening soon in Birmingham, AL. They also had three overseas in Bahrain, which closed in 2017.

This is the mall's oldest food court, which I believe has been here since 1965. It was redone in 2013, because the 90's remodel skipped over it somehow. Here's how it looked before.

Since I'm already sharing vintage mall pictures, have some more.

 The first floor GameStop, which I remember beginning life as an EB Games. It's cut off in the picture, but there's a wall off to the right that still has EB's signature blue and yellow tile.

The now-former JCPenney, as seen from the bottom floor. I'd never really thought about the mall looking dated at all until I read about the upcoming remodel. Now I can sorta see it, especially from this vantage point. I guess it's about time, it's been about 20 years since the last renovation.

 This was a Foot Locker. At the time, I was thinking this store was the biggest, most modern Foot Locker I'd ever seen. I stand corrected. In 2017, they moved into an even bigger and more modern location close to the mall's Tesla dealer.

 Bath and Body Works. Of the store designs they've had over the years, this one has always been my favorite.

 I think Savor might be the name of the restaurant being built out behind that tarp.

 The Teavana store, which would have been very short-lived had Simon not sued Starbucks over the closure. Since this is a Simon mall, I'm pleased to report this is still open. Correction: Closed June 2018.

Macy's new connection to the expansion. I was really worried the expansion would mess up the 80's style Bamberger's glass awnings over the other entrances. Thankfully, Macy's cares little enough about their stores that they weren't altered.

Even though this store hasn't been remodeled anywhere near recently, they still replaced the fluorescent lighting with LED's. Maybe that was in preparation for later construction? Update: Macy's is remodeling for real as of late 2018.

 There were also a number of Asian stores in the mall. I assumed this was one of them, but apparently this company is British, and specializes in "Japanese-style apparel."

 American Girl, another store that I believe was displaced from the Court. I'm hoping it was still under construction, otherwise that's a pretty abysmal interior. Update: this has since closed. I'm not sure if this was temporary or what was going on.

 I was surprised to see Gap and Temput-Pedic in this part of the mall. There were only a few non-designer tenants in this section, which I later figured out were put here because their old places were knocked down to connect the expansion to the existing mall.

 The new Bloomingdale's entrance. I have mixed feelings on the gray pixel-y storefront. It has a nice modern look, but also looks really cheap.

View from the walkway leading from the expansion to Bloomingdale's. This section of the mall was practically rebuilt, which I thought was a little overkill. You probably figured this out already, but the reconstruction stops where the stepped ceiling begins.

 Bonsai Gallery and Marbles were originally someplace else in the Court. If I remember correctly, Marbles was where they had to knock down to connect the expansion, while Bonsai Gallery was on the first floor, and bumped up here for the new Bloomingdale's entrance. Also, in the background, is one of the mall's two Starbucks.

Bloomingdale's entrance again, from an angle. The front of the store here looks pretty modern, so I assumed it was redone as well. Turns out, it's looked like that since at least 2008.

 Bloomingdale's original entrance. I'm not sure if this part of the mall will be remodeled, since they did a significant amount of work here when the expansion was put in. It's cut off in this picture, but the flooring inside the black square was replaced, too. The tan tile around the edges was there from previously. They also replaced the lights in here- there used to be big copper hoods pointed up at the ceiling.

 Sur La Table, which is like a more expensive version of Kitchen Kapers. I'm not sure why I thought this was worth a picture, but I had this so I might as well post it. :P

Looking towards the former Strawbridge's. This opened with the Court in 1981 as Abraham & Strauss, which was bought out by Strawbridge's in the 90's. They later moved to the old Wanamaker's, replacing Hecht's. Their old store was a normal enough shape that they were able to subdivide it into more mall space and another food court. This space is three levels, the top of which can only be accessed from inside. It's home to Ethan Allen.

 The mall's second GNC, which closed down shortly after the expansion happened. Like I said earlier, it's no longer two malls so they don't need to be present in both. This one was also the smaller/more outdated of the two, which probably played into its demise.

 View from the floor below. The lower two levels are divided up into smaller tenants, a smaller food court, and a 2-story Urban Outfitters.

 Old Navy is another one of the larger stores in this part of the mall. This one is only one level, though.

The skylight over the center of the store. I'm guessing this is where the stairs would have originally been.

 Looking out the third floor of Strawbridge's. Even though Ethan Allen takes up the entire floor, the way up there is public mall space. A lot of work was done to subdivide this store, although I think just about everything pictured here is original to the department store. Those lights and columns look a little older than the rest of this space, and that hanging medallion thing probably held S&C's Seal of Confidence at one point. Edit: As Retail Retell pointed out, it still says "SC" on top of the medallion!

 The new Floor & Decor in Devon had an advertisement out. Here's how it looked before. (which in my opinion was a much better look).

 Looking up at the expansion from the Court floor. I'm pretty sure that Gap store is new, or at least relocated.

The Chocolate Moonshine Co. I've never been inside here myself, but they catered the chocolate for my high school's senior prom.

One of the mall's two Lenscrafters stores. The mall's website lists this as a normal Lenscrafters, and the other one as Lenscrafters Optique. I don't know what the difference is, or if there even is one.

Also, this area still had the old floor tile pattern. It was the only square in the court that didn't have it replaced yet, so I'm guessing it was just a matter of time.

 More appliances and 80's flooring. This section also still had the old lights. The displays look pretty new, though. I'm wondering if they were going to refresh the flooring at the same time they replace the lighting.

 The ceiling had a cool treatment over the appliance section. I imagine those bars are meant to hang stuff off of and not just for looks, but I thought it was a neat design nonetheless.

Taking a closer look at these photos, I'm starting to think all the carpet might also be new.

I can say for sure that tile's been here since 1982.

The Last Act department was a somewhat recent addition. The square recessed lights were also very new, in fact they were still installing them while I was here.

 That's a lot of winter coats. I'm not sure if that was just since it was getting close to winter when I took these photos, or if this Macy's just has a large coat department.

This part of the store still had the old fluorescent lights. I'm wondering if the drywall ceiling complicated the process at all.

I want to say that wood flooring is also new, but I have no way of telling.

 This store has been fixed up a bit over the years, but has never had a full remodel. Parts of it, like you see here, still look very 1982.

Another blurry look at the Men's department. I like the way the ceiling is shaped here, with the lower part carrying the sign not touching the top part.

A blurry look inside Macy's, just inside the plaza-side entrance. These pictures were taken in October. No clue why they have all these Christmas decorations up already.

 The entrance to Macy's. They came out a little washed-out in the picture, but I've always been a fan of the bare-bulb lights running along the top of the glass wall.

The main entrance to the expansion. I believe there are escalators here that take you up to the new food court.

 The mall's new facade, displaying their new Simon-ified logo. I think this may have been their first mall to get the logo up on a sign.

The old logo wasn't that great to begin with, so I think this is actually an upgrade.

 The walkway adjacent to Neiman Marcus, which was the first part of the covered walkway connecting the Court and Plaza. I was expecting the expansion to replace the walkway entirely, but they surprisingly kept it in service. They rebuilt the canopy over it to match the mall, too.

Lord & Taylor was added onto the mall in 1995, on the site of the former ACME. The surrounding portion of the mall was rebuilt around the same time.

This is perhaps the worst-named store in the mall. It looks like somebody swiped their hand across the keyboard and called it good.

On an unrelated note I'm starting a store and calling it BYSBSJNEWUI.

This store survived the chain's bankruptcy, and is still open.

 Thrift Drug was an original tenant to the mall, opening in 1963 in what was then the strip mall. It relocated here in the 90's when most of the strip mall was torn down to make way for the Plaza expansion. It later became Eckerd, and subsequently Rite Aid. This store has both a mall entrance and an exterior one. Rite Aid remodeled it to their Customer World decor shortly after the buyout; although I think the fancy wooden exterior dates back to Thrift Drug.

I imagine this is one of the few mall stores they don't want to replace with a freestanding one, so I wouldn't be surprised if they it gets remodeled again soon.

It's also the only non-supermarket Pharmacy on this end of town.

 Forever 21, which takes up most of the 2011 expansion. Its entrance is about where Wanamaker's was, although it creeps out into the court a little bit. Contrary to popular belief, the Wanamaker's was built as a department store and not an octagonal amphitheater. The smaller octagonal court in front of it, which I was standing just outside of in this picture, was most likely the actual amphitheater, which would have been converted into more mall space in 1965.

 Marmot, which either opened new or relocated here around the time the former Wanamaker's was torn down. The Wanamaker's site was replaced with more mall space in 2011, most of which was taken up by a 2-level Forever 21 (Which is opening a new store in nearby Plymouth Meeting soon; I feel like they're a little too close). There was space for a couple extra smaller stores, so there was some shuffling around in this area of the mall.

 I told you, the mall has a Tesla dealer! You can't buy cars off the lot here, but you can have them ordered and customize them here. Along the walls, they have diagrams of how the cars look, and examples of the finishes you can order.

I may have posed for a photo in that car.

The Apple store, which I *think* moved to this location somewhat recently. I want to say they had to move because their original store was where the expansion now opens up to the Plaza.

 The Brookstone store. I was initially going to leave this one out because of the blurriness, but decided that since it had a still-open American Apparel in the background I might as well keep it. I don't know what took over the former AA space, although I'm pretty sure it's not vacant currently. Update: Now as of 2019, these stores are both a thing of the past. :P

 Finish Line. I don't know of too many of these that are still open, and I heard the chain was in trouble so I decided to get a picture before it was too late.

This picture was from when Aeropostale went bankrupt and announced total liquidation. Next time I visited this mall, the store was shuttered, but was back up and operating again by the following visit.

Inset is a photo from when this part of the mall was first added on in 1965. This was the first enclosed portion of the mall to be built. The original mall opened two years prior, and was little more than a glorified strip mall at the time. Practically none of that remains, only the original Penney's, Korvette's, and Woolworth stand, all of which have been divided up into more mall space that is indistinguishable from the rest of the mall from the inside.

 Zumiez, which I think is a skateboarding apparel store. I had a friend in high school that worked at their Exton store, he was your typical long-ish hair counterculture skateboard guy. He sorta set this store's stereotype for me.

 Hot Topic, next to what I believe was the only vacancy on this floor. The first floor had a number of vacancies, all of which were stores that relocated to the expansion. It's been two years, so I'm guessing those spaces have probably filled by now.

The 90's Plaza food court, the 4th and final one for the tour. I believe this food court won't be around forever. The part I took this picture from was closed when a massive new Sephora store replaced the restaurants behind it.

I was trying to get a picture of the awesomely (or horribly depending on your tastes) 90's style Starburst Cafe across the way. Unfortunately, the neon all washed out in this photo. Don't worry- I know I have another, better photo from a different visit.

Inside Neiman Marcus, which I think was the first/only time I've set foot in this store. The furniture department looks less like a store and more like a showroom. Part of what makes this store fancy must be how little clutter there is, which is very different from other department stores.

Neiman Marcus' expansion entrance. I liked the design of this a lot.