California Apparel News

Rick Caruso attracts shoppers from 78 zip codes with his faux street scenes at The Grove shopping center in Los Angeles. The developer is gambling he will make similar magic next month when he opens The Lakes at Thousand Oaks shopping center.

Caruso is using nature as the draw, with four acres of lush parkland. He is betting that wealthy residents in Thousand Oaks, Calif., will skip traveling to Los Angeles County malls so they can walk on The Lakes’ fields, hang out at the shopping center’s plaza and shop for clothes at independent boutiques such as Sophea Parros.

The Lakes, which opens July 20, includes a seven-acre outdoor complex dominated by a park, two lakes and a public plaza. It will be constructed next to Thousand Oaks’ popular Civic Arts Plaza and Performing Arts Center, which lack restaurants for before- and after-theater diners. To address that issue, The Lakes will feature several eateries, including P.F. Chang’s and California Pizza Kitchen. The mall’s 18,000 square feet of retail will include stores such as White House/Black Market and Brighton Collectibles.

The Lakes is part of Caruso Affiliated Holdings’ ambitious plans to build $1 billion of retail across California, a move that should double the Los Angeles company’s holdings in the state. Often called lifestyle malls, Caruso’s shopping centers emphasize retail environments that pack the glitter of a high-end amusement park with the social scene of a town square, once the center of American public life.

It’s a compelling mix for cities looking for new sales-tax revenues. According to Scott Mitnick, Thousand Oaks’ interim city manager, the new shopping center should bring more than $400,000 a year in sales tax to the city by keeping entertainment-hungry people in town.

While Caruso has no plans to compete against entertainment entities, he said the various features at the mall, such as the park and the restaurants, were built for a reason: They drive the bottom line.

“[The Lakes] is a place that people will want to come to for no other reason than just to hang out,” Caruso said. “When shopping centers become people’s gathering places, [those people] will reward you by shopping there.”

Revenue for Caruso’s shopping center division has grown 23 percent annually during the past five years, the developer said. Sales per square foot at Caruso’s malls average $700 to $800, much more than the national average of $366. According to Caruso, The Grove is one of the three highest-grossing malls in California.

Lifestyle centers are rising in popularity in America. According to the International Conference of Shopping Centers in New York, 20 lifestyle centers will be built in the United States in 2005, while only seven traditional regional malls are scheduled to open this year.

George Whalin, president of Retail Management Consultants in San Marcos, Calif., said lifestyle centers are perfect for California.“The primary criterion is that you have a densely populated center and decent real estate,” Whalin said. “There’s not a lot of that around the country, but California happens to have a number of places that are ideal for it.”

Other Caruso plans in the works include:

bull; Golden Gate Fields This fall, Caruso Affiliated will submit plans to build a shopping center in Albany, Calif., near San Francisco. Caruso said this project, set to open in 2008, will be built near the beach and have views of the Golden Gate Bridge and downtown San Francisco.

bull; Americana at Brand Demolition has begun to develop this mixed-use center in Glendale, Calif. Americana will feature 475,000 square feet of retail space surrounding a two-acre park. The development, scheduled to open in 2007, will also house up to 278 apartments and condominiums.

bull; Santa Anita Park This summer, the city of Arcadia, Calif., is scheduled to start reviewing an environmental impact report for this 1.1 million-square-foot development. The center would include 800,000 square feet of retail space and 300 residential units.

bull; Waterside Marina Opening in October 2005, the project will feature 130,000 square feet of retail space in Marina del Rey, Calif. Caruso calls it a neighborhood lifestyle center with casual dining and shopping.

bull; The Village at Playa Vista This is another neighborhood lifestyle center that will feature 195,000 square feet of retail and 175 apartments. It will be located at Playa Vista, Calif., adjacent to Marina del Rey.

Caruso’s debut of The Lakes should be something of a homecoming. Among the first projects built by Caruso Affiliated were two Thousand Oaks shopping centers: The Promenade at Westlake and The Village at Moorpark. Both opened in 1996.

Caruso said the success of these shopping centers helped his company gain approval for its most recent project in Thousand Oaks, a town well known in the development community for its slow-growth policies. Before the company built The Promenade and The Village, Thousand Oaks’ only major commercial development was The Oaks shopping center, built in 1979.

Other shopping centers Caruso has built include The Commons at Calabasas in Calabasas, Calif., and Encino Marketplace in Los Angeles.