California Apparel News

The Irvine Spectrum Center is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, and the entertainment-focused shopping center in Irvine, Calif., will blaze a new path for its birthday: fashion.

In September, the Spectrum will open a new specialty shopping wing. The new area will feature a 125,000-square-foot Nordstrom anchor and 80,000 square feet of specialty retailing, according to Spectrum developer The Irvine Co. The wing, already 80 percent leased, will include Metropark, Rip Curl, White House/Black Market, Anthropologie and Bebe stores. And the apparel retail choices should become more diverse when construction of a 135,000-square-foot Target is completed by July 2006. When Target opens for business, the center will stretch to 1 million square feet.

The new wing and the opportunity to share some real estate with blue-chip retailers has attracted businesspeople such as Metropark President Lawrence Tanenbaum.

“We’re targeting major regional malls with the anchors of Bloomingdale’s and Nordstrom,” said Tanenbaum, who said the company plans to develop the newly launched contemporary streetwear store into a 300-store chain. “There’s a huge opportunity, with the addition of Nordstrom and other specialty stores, to position Irvine Spectrum as one of the dominant shopping destinations in Orange County.”

Orange crush

Competition in Orange County is already tough. Stellar luxury centers such as South Coast Plaza and The Irvine Co.’s own Fashion Island already do business less than 12 miles north of the Spectrum. And competition might soon get fiercer.

Los Angeles–based J.H. Snyder & Co. will complete construction of the open-air entertainment center Bella Terra in Huntington Beach, Calif., in late 2005. Bella Terra, located a few miles north of South Coast Plaza, will be a 765,991-square-foot retail center anchored by a 20-screen Century Theatres megaplex.

Phoenix-based Vestar Development Co. plans to build The District at Tustin Legacy less than 10 miles south of the Spectrum. The 1 million-square-foot shopping center, located at the former U.S. Marine Corps Air Base in Tustin, Calif., will focus on specialty retail and upscale dining. The first phase of construction should be completed in March 2006, according to a spokesperson from the City of Tustin.

While just one of these shopping centers could crush the competition in many parts of the United States, Jeff Dodd, senior vice president of leasing at The Irvine Co., said the Spectrum is well-positioned.

“Orange County is one of the strongest retail markets in the country,” Dodd said. “Our centers are thriving, and we believe there is plenty of demand. Nordstrom and Target know their markets and where their customers are as well as any retailer in the country. Their desire to open new stores here speaks to their long-term faith in the Irvine Spectrum Center.”

Orange County’s dense demographic of young, wealthy consumers attracts shopping center developers like a gold rush, said George Whalin, a retail analyst for San Marcos, Calif.–based Retail Management Consultants.

“There’s been too much retail in Southern California for 20 years. It’s not going to stop now,” Whalin said. “Every retailer looks at the demographics and says, ’I want some of that business.’ But the Spectrum found a niche, and they’ve become a destination center.”

The Spectrum opened at the crest of the entertainment center craze in the 1990s. It is still home to a Dave & Buster’s restaurant and arcade complex. It is one of the only shopping centers to claim nightspots such as the Improv Comedy Club and country music theater Crazy Horse Saloon, where legendary musicians, including Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard, have performed.

The Spectrum’s entertainment choices, including a 108-foot-tall Ferris wheel, and wide plaza-style design give suburban Orange County something novel, said Olga Bicos, a writer living in Huntington Beach.

“It’s a gathering place, like the old city squares,” Bicos said. “You see families at the sidewalk cafes, kids walking arm in arm.”

But the entertainment focus has been toned down in recent years. The former space of the Sing Sing piano bar, for example, will become a Pacific Sunwear store in May. A wave of fashion retailers has already changed the center’s character during the past two years. They include Forever 21, Windsor, Robinsons-May, Ann Taylor, Hollister Co. and Oakley.

“In the beginning, the Spectrum was out of balance,” Dodd said. “There was so much that was unusual. We probably earned an advanced degree in merchandising through everything we tried.”

But fashion has brought maturity to the shopping center. “Now we have balance,” Dodd said.