Centre of Tallahassee (Tallahassee Mall) | Tallahassee, FL | Former Major Mall Redeveloped.

The Center of Tallahassee, once known as Tallahassee Mall, opened for business in 1971. The mall was roughly 700,000 square feet, and was anchored by Montgomery Ward, Gayfers and Woolco, with junior anchors McCrory's and Walgreens. Back then, it usurped Northwood Mall as the largest and newest mall in Tallahassee. Northwood Mall would be dead and gone by 1986, but Tallahassee Mall was seemingly still going strong during that time, even in spite of a newer mall, Governors Square, having opened in 1978. An anchor change happened when Woolco closed with the entire chain in 1983, which was then replaced by Zayre. When Zayre got bought by Ames, it then became an Ames, for all the Ames lovers.

By the time of the 1990's though, trouble would appear. The malls 1992 expansion lacked two planned department stores, one of which was going to be Mervyn's, and thus the 100,000 square foot expansion only added Parisian. It also cut the Montgomery Ward Anchor in half. When the expansion launched, not one single storefront was leased, and by 1995 the malls occupancy fell to 45%. This occupancy number was after adding Service Merchandise and Goody's to replace Zayre when they closed. One positive of the time was the addition of a 20 screen AMC Theater in one of the failed planned anchor pads, next to the Parisian.

Issues were made worse going into the new millennium, when Service Merchandise closed in 1999, and Montgomery Ward in 2000. Of course that's not necessarily the fault of the mall, failing brands were going to fail, but it wasn't good for the already struggling mall.

Ownership turmoil going towards the 2008 financial crisis put the mall into an even worse spot, with reports of its then owner, Feldman Mall Properties, not doing much of anything to benefit the mall, and having bad financials on the property. To make matters worse, the Gayfers, now Dillards due to their acquisition, closed in January 2008, and sat vacant for years.

By the time of the 2010's, the mall was really starting to die, and began to become notable as a dead mall, with certain explorers documenting it during this time. In 2014, the process was started to turn the original mall portion into an lifestyle center, with government services and a small venue location being key draws to the new property. However, much of its original ambitions to make small exterior shops and a venue entertainment district fell through, according to locals, and today much of the lifestyle space is abandoned or not even built out. The only part of the interior shopping mall left is what was essentially the basement level, with entrances to the AMC Theater and the former Parisian turned Belk. Today it appears that the mall portion only has 1 business left, a barber shop, with 2 abandoned storefronts cut off from the rest of the now repurposed section of the mall, and a former restaurant space.

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Footage was filmed in August 2024.

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Osmo Pocket 1 (Recording Device)
Galaxy S22 Ultra (Cinematics)
Capcut Pro (Editor)
Thumbnails done by ‪@blandmalls‬ !

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Song: Energetic Particles
Song: Bright Clouds
Song: To The Lights
Song: Gravity
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