The Gardens Meet Their Waterloo: Round 2- Electric Boogaloo

If you'll remember, back in my early days on Flickr, I posted a couple photos from the closure and demolition of the Waterloo Gardens in Exton. Well, that wasn't the last you'll be seeing of it. Their Devon store is coming down too, and I've got enough photos of it to give them their own post. It's the least I could do for one of my favorite stores. 

Founded in Devon in 1942, Waterloo gardens was the Main Line's most popular garden center and housewares shop. This location was their first. As they grew, they needed more land to grow the plants they sell on so they acquired a field in Exton in 1959. In 1970, they opened their second store on that property. In 2007, they tried to expand by opening two new smaller store-only (no nursery) locations in Warminster PA and Wilmington DE. Warminster, which opened in a former Pathmark, failed after only one year. It later became an IGA, and currently awaits demolition for a Lidl. Strip mall anchor Wilmington fared a little better, but closed too in 2011. It is now a Five Below. 

These two locations ultimately dragged the whole company down. Following the death of the longtime owner in 2012, they made the decision to consolidate the Devon location into the Exton one, since it was larger and had a more straightforward layout. Sadly, that was not enough to save them and they filed for bankruptcy in 2013. Bruce Toll, formerly of Toll brothers, bought the property off of them and demolished the Exton store for a housing development immediately after they closed. Devon sat vacant until 2017, when it was demolished for "Devon Yard," a mixed use development consisting of a new, smaller garden center, a couple restaurants, and Anthropologie's new corporate headquarters and flagship store (which relocated here from down the road in Wayne). Interestingly, Anthropologie owns the garden center and one restaurant, while the other restaurant is owned by none other than Philadelphia-based Urban Outfitters. As for the Waterloo Gardens brand, it was picked up by Main Line Gardens in Malvern. From what I've heard, the family that owned Waterloo is now working for another nursery in the area. I remember they were very nice people, and it was one of my favorite stores, so it makes me sad to see them go.

At this point in the demolition, they had only torn up the middle of the greenhouse connecting the two buildings. The one in back here was an annex with an interesting history. We'll be seeing more of that soon.

Looking to the side of the building facing Lancaster Ave. This was the location of the original store, but I'm pretty sure it was rebuilt at some point.

This was the store's main entrance from the parking on Devon Blvd. The border between the store's yard and parking used to have a large wisteria-laden wooden trellis going along it, which now sits in pieces on the left.

The exterior of the store itself was rather plain, but back when they had the yard filled with merchandise it didn't look that way.

More piles of trellis, which used to extend all the way to the building to make a semi-roof over the yard.

A pile of sadness. :(

Some surviving trellis in front of the storefront. I'm pleasantly surprised to see they salvaged a lot of the plants Waterloo left along here, but it would seem the tree was too big to pull out and stick in a pot.

Looking into the former store entrance. I could have so easily gotten in here and snagged some interior photos, I'm kicking myself for not doing it.

At the corner of Devon and Lancaster. It looks like a window got knocked out up there.

Storefront along Lancaster. Note the awnings still bear their logo.

The store's front yard is pretty torn up. There used to be a few circular planters out here.

The building itself never had their signage on it, it was hung on the trellis' white panel instead.

The sign itself is gone, but the decoration around it lasted until the end.

The greenhouse bordering Santander's parking lot wasn't fenced off, but the textured plastic made it impossible for me to see inside.

Their rear parking lot, which I believe they acquired alongside the annex building.

That little peak in the roof was their rear entrance.

The paneling between the windows of the annex was pulled off, presumably for asbestos remediation, giving us another glance inside. This part of the store was where they sold housewares and small furniture.

As you can probably guess, this wasn't always three stories of retail space. It was originally home to the Deveraux Foundation, a special needs school and childcare center, which was built in the late 60's or early 70's. I can't tell if this location was closed or just relocated, since Deveraux has another facility nearby that surprisingly looks much older than this. Waterloo Gardens had definitely taken over the space by the late 80's and turned it all into retail space. It's really unusual seeing a store this tall, especially in an area like this.

In removing the paneling, they've completely trashed the place.

Even though it was a store for over 20 years, it looked like an office up until the end.

On the other side of the building, there was a smaller parking lot which I believe was reserved for employees.

Heading around back of the annex.

I thought this was a kinda neat design for the back of a building to have.

The smaller greenhouse, which was built to connect the annex to the main greenhouse.

Those are flowers, but I have a feeling Waterloo didn't plant them here.

Across Devon Blvd, there was the main parking lot and 4 homes circa 1925. I'm pretty sure Waterloo bought them just so they could turn their back yards into a parking lot, but despite that they kept them maintained and most likely used them as rentals.

By the time I got here, all the houses had already been torn down. Currently, there's a new parking lot on the site. The original plan was to put apartments here, which the township rejected. The fact that they put a surface parking lot here instead of a smaller development makes me think they haven't given up on apartments just yet.

This was just about all that was left of the houses at this point.

A Waterloo sign directing people to the mulch piles in the back of the parking lot survived the closing, but couldn't escape the redevelopment. This matches their old logo- same font, background, and border.

Looking across Devon Blvd to the main store.

It was a magnificent place, I'm sad to see it go.

For today's song, it would be wrong to pick anything other than this!