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Greenspoint Mall Memories


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On May 6, 2009 at 9:02 AM, hydeaway said:

The Anna's Linens location in the pic was originally an Oshman's sporting goods.

Anyone have any pics of Greenspoint when it was at its zenith? I have been searching for some across the internet with no success. Thanks!

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On April 21, 2009 at 8:42 PM, hydeaway said:

Has anyone ever come across any photos of Greenspoint in its heyday? Such as the fountain with the restaurant on top, the "high flyers" sculpture, etc? Remember the children's play area with the rubber floor with the yellow and red cubes we climbed and played in?

1: the "high flyers" sculpture

2: the children's court

3:an artist rendering of the center court.

I found these photos from a Facebook group.

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Edited by victor giron
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On 5/15/2016 at 9:37 PM, victor giron said:

I found these photos from a Facebook group.

 

Victor, funny thing... that's hydeaway's Facebook group you found those on. So in trying to help him, you're only giving him back his own stuff. I know, because I originally provided him those documents to put on Facebook. LOL!

 

Obviously you didn't know that. How could you? But it's pretty funny, nonetheless. Still, I'm sure I speak for him in saying thanks for the effort. That's what really counts.

 

 

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10 hours ago, Firebird65 said:

 

Victor, funny thing... that's hydeaway's Facebook group you found those on. So in trying to help him, you're only giving him back his own stuff. I know, because I originally provided him those documents to put on Facebook. LOL!

 

Obviously you didn't know that. How could you? But it's pretty funny, nonetheless. Still, I'm sure I speak for him in saying thanks for the effort. That's what really counts.

 

 

Oops... Sorry, I obviously didn't notice at all. Next time I will double check before I post something.

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18 minutes ago, victor giron said:

Oops... Sorry, I obviously didn't notice at all. Next time I will double check before I post something.

No way you could have known. No problem. 

 

But as I know him personally and as I'm the one who gave him those, I just found the episode amusing. But there's no way you could have checked. You didn't do anything wrong nor do you have anything to apologize for.

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By the way, where did you got those documents from? I've been scanning througout the entire internet for other high quality photos of the mall with out any success other than the ones posted in here.

ive always wanted to see how the fountain with "chimes" looked like and the entrances but sadly I wasn't born early enough to even see when that mall got renovated... Any help would be appreciated.

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19 hours ago, victor giron said:

By the way, where did you got those documents from? I've been scanning througout the entire internet for other high quality photos of the mall with out any success other than the ones posted in here.

ive always wanted to see how the fountain with "chimes" looked like and the entrances but sadly I wasn't born early enough to even see when that mall got renovated... Any help would be appreciated.

 

Houston Post or Houston Chronicle microfilm, I forget which. August 1976 was when the mall opened and when that special advertising section ran. It might have been in both papers, but one was clearer than the other. As I said, I forget which. 

 

DON'T go to the Houston Public Library... they'll charge you for paper copies, plus you have to fight off the homeless. Go instead to the University of Houston Library. You can save the files onto a flash drive or you can print them for free (you don't have to be a student or an alumni to use the facilities). 

 

If I still had them, I'd attach them here for you, but I didn't bother to scan them. I found them for hydeaway (an old high school friend) while doing another project several years ago. I'm interested in the history of Greenspoint Mall, but only to a degree. So I didn't keep a copy. It's his passion.  

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  • 2 months later...
On May 20, 2016 at 5:30 PM, Firebird65 said:

 

Houston Post or Houston Chronicle microfilm, I forget which. August 1976 was when the mall opened and when that special advertising section ran. It might have been in both papers, but one was clearer than the other. As I said, I forget which. 

 

DON'T go to the Houston Public Library... they'll charge you for paper copies, plus you have to fight off the homeless. Go instead to the University of Houston Library. You can save the files onto a flash drive or you can print them for free (you don't have to be a student or an alumni to use the facilities). 

 

If I still had them, I'd attach them here for you, but I didn't bother to scan them. I found them for hydeaway (an old high school friend) while doing another project several years ago. I'm interested in the history of Greenspoint Mall, but only to a degree. So I didn't keep a copy. It's his passion.  

Thanks!  Also do you know the month the Montgomery wards opened? I am planning on going back to look for photos of that section of the mall.

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  • 1 year later...

I found this in a Texas Monthly ad from 1982 while I was looking for something else: https://books.google.com/books?id=CC4EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=magnamart+san+antonio&source=bl&ots=jlX0dLkUwF&sig=zj7TJP5TB_oKHjQE3WqOJEpB2ic&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiR_bKS7t_XAhVB8IMKHU6eDRIQ6AEIMzAC#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

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(The name and logo of Greenspoint were located under it, so it is Greenspoint). The presence of the stairs is intriguing, I thought Greenspoint was only one level.

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2 hours ago, IronTiger said:

 

The mall itself was only 1 level, Tiger. There once was a second floor in the center court, which was originally a café. Each of the department stores had a second floor, i.e. Lord & Taylor, Montgomery Ward's, J.C. Penney's, Joske's, Foley's, and Sears. Sears & Joske's closed off their second floors off first. As of today, there isn't a second floor open to the public anywhere within the entirety of Greenspoint.

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13 hours ago, Purpledevil said:

 

The mall itself was only 1 level, Tiger. There once was a second floor in the center court, which was originally a café. Each of the department stores had a second floor, i.e. Lord & Taylor, Montgomery Ward's, J.C. Penney's, Joske's, Foley's, and Sears. Sears & Joske's closed off their second floors off first. As of today, there isn't a second floor open to the public anywhere within the entirety of Greenspoint.

I was aware that the department stores all had (originally) upper levels, much like the situation at Memorial City Mall (except for Target). The "upper level café" is new information to me, though, and I don't think I've ever seen a set of stairs in the center courts. I'm going to guess that it was removed in the renovation in the late 1980s or early 1990s, and the space walled up. Without a floorplan or being there it's a little hard to tell, but this walled up area near the skylights sure looks suspicious...

 

EDIT: It is not the same court, but the correct court with the fountains and correct columns still seem to lack a staircase...

Edited by IronTiger
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15 hours ago, IronTiger said:

I was aware that the department stores all had (originally) upper levels, much like the situation at Memorial City Mall (except for Target). The "upper level café" is new information to me, though, and I don't think I've ever seen a set of stairs in the center courts. I'm going to guess that it was removed in the renovation in the late 1980s or early 1990s, and the space walled up. Without a floorplan or being there it's a little hard to tell, but this walled up area near the skylights sure looks suspicious...

 

EDIT: It is not the same court, but the correct court with the fountains and correct columns still seem to lack a staircase...

Given what I remember of the café and waterfalls, I'd be pretty certain it was all demo'ed when management renovated the mall in the late 80's. That's when the ficus and all of the cool sculptures were removed from the corridors, and my favorite water feature in front of Montgomery Ward's met its demise. It used to fill up with water on one end, dump the water when full, and raise up on the other end striking a brass pipe that let out the most beautiful gong. The walled up area near the skylights would be too high to conceal the stairs. The skylights were there from the beginning, and cascaded sunlight down onto the center court and subsequent café area. Ah, yes. The days when Greenspoint was still classy.

 

What predated Target at Memorial City Mall was Montgomery Ward's. It was an old dookie brown colored building that simply screamed 1970. Indeed, it too had a second floor. Sat right across the mall corridor from the recruitment offices for the Armed Forces, and oh yeah, the best Whataburger that Memorial has ever known.

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The Chron archives tell me that the Greenspoint renovation happened in 1988 (April to October). @hydeaway is almost certainly the person who wrote the DeadMalls.com article, and 1988 was when the trees and fountains disappeared and the floors were replaced with "almost glow in the dark multicolored tiles" rather than the dark brick-like tiles it used to have. It was Federated that opened the mall in the 1970s and built the two expansions that would add Joske's and Montgomery Ward to the mall, but it was Prudential Insurance Co. (or rather a pension fund that Prudential ran) that was the one to run Greenspoint into the ground, with the decline happening under their reign and a single 1988 renovation that somehow made the mall worse.

 

In terms of the cafe, at about 4:35 of this video you can see the skylights of the center court with a kiosk (Houston Visitor's Center) protruding into the court, with a white wall above it. However, according to the aerial photograph of said center court, you should be able to see the skylight from any corner, as they go all the way to the end, if you look at the center court from above on Google Earth (it is on the side opposite where they peak outward). Since I have no idea what the café area looked like since I was born after 1988 (1991, thank you) I have come to the rudimentary conclusion that based on the video, the aerial photos, and the old photo, that the café (which I still don't know the name of) was on the side closest to Sears and Joske's, and the 1988 renovation tore down the stairs and walled up what was left, explaining why you can't see the other end of where the two skylight sides meet.

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  • 7 months later...
On 4/4/2011 at 10:13 PM, hydeaway said:

When I was in high school in 1981-1985, our drafting class was shown blueprints for an upscale mall that was to be built in the Greens Crossing portion of Greenspoint just across the freeway. It was to include a Bloomingdales and an ice skating rink. The Paragon building(s) -- one of three that was actually built -- was supposed to be connected via a skywalk. When the energy bust came, the plans were scrapped and they build the now defunct "power center" that had included Phar Mor, Children's Palace Toys, Circuit City, etc on the site. Did anyone else see those blueprints or know about this? What was the name of the planned mall? Any other prospective tenants you were aware of? It shows how upscale Greenspoint was at its zenith. Remember Lord & Taylor, Walter Pyes, Benetton, Jarrod's Polo Shop, Isabell Gerhart and other high end stores Greenspoint Mall had in its quiver?

A bit late on the draw for this one, but @SpaceGhost and I did find mention of it in the Houston Post in 1981, but we didn't find any more information on it other than it really was planned at one time, and that it would be co-developed with the developer of NorthPark Center in Dallas and designed by the same people.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Visit report. I found myself in the area on Wednesday and thought I would stop by the greenspoint mall for nostalgia (42 years young this week I think). Like others, I was a frequent visitor to this mall in its prime and witnessed its sad decline. I arrived around noon and there was nothing going on. Shady jewelry stores (why would anyone want gold teeth), mom and pop clothing stores (one was called boujee, which made me laugh), a clearance palis royal, champs, foot locker, and a school uniform store that seemed to be getting the most business. There was only a roman delight pizza, Chinese restaurant, and a thirstys for nourishment. The retro video game store was neat but everything was ebay prices if you know what I mean. There was a toy store that sold knock offs and marked up legit items. The visible changes by the food court is now a barber shop. African imports is a cool store. I just glanced over at the movie theatre. Man, how I wish those old school general cinemas were around. Loved them. The interior of the mall is in bad shape. I found myself tripping over broken floor tiles on a few occasions. The stores seemed to not be getting decent air flow. They were warm to say the least.  The landscaping and parking lot are just not maintained. I basically spent an hour walking around and remembering where former stores and restaurants were located. Now for the question portion of the post:

 

1. Someone earlier recalled the chick fil a being two stories as do I. Anyone ever witness this design in a 70s era mall before?

2. I heard the food court was the last to fall once all the businesses in the area left? Is this true?

3. Why will the owner of the mall not offer dirt cheap rent, to say the gap or old navy, so they are at least guaranteed to make a profit and fill vacant space? I think gangsters enjoy khakis. :) The owner would need to fix up the mall of course and provide security.

4. Wasn't there an announcement last year that the mall would be closed and all tenants evicted? I'm guessing this does not happen for legal reasons.

 

 

 

 

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16 hours ago, brunsonpark08 said:

There was only a roman delight pizza, Chinese restaurant, and a thirstys for nourishment. 

 

 

16 hours ago, brunsonpark08 said:

2. I heard the food court was the last to fall once all the businesses in the area left? Is this true?

 

 

Wow, that is pretty grim. I haven't been to the mall in several years, but I worked on a project in the area about ten years ago and consequently used to hit the Brothers' Pizza in the food court semi-regularly for lunch. At that time, although the food court wasn't 100% occupied, there were certainly more than three tenants there. I recall a Cajun place, a Sbarro, a sandwich shop, and a frozen yogurt shop, among others.

 

I think you're correct about the food court hanging on longer than other areas of the mall, as it was still doing decent business after there were already lots of empty storefronts in the mall. Exxon vacating their nearby office space once their new corporate campus opened was probably the death blow for the food court, as when they were still in the area the food court was quite busy with office workers during the lunch hour. 

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  • 4 years later...

I remember the cafe' here at Greenspoint...we used to park on the east side of the mall to come in at the Oshman's located near Fascination's Hair Salon (it then turned into a Visible Changes. I remember a couple of Houston Gambler Cheerleaders -Highrollers- used to cut hair there) but...the cafe' did have a stairway going to the top (had pretty decent burger here) also what was so cool was that there was a walkway that went under that was walking thru a waterfall...so cool.  this walkway also went past the elevator that took you to the cafe'.  Ate there a lot from 1980-1982...there is a rendering I have seen that is exact in how that area looked...man, miss that old mall!

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Greenspoint Mall's owners need to get with a Hollywood movie studio to use the rotting corpse as a prop in an action movie a la the 1985 Chuck Norris flick Invasion USA. Have terrorists or aliens "attack" the mall and blow it to smithereens. Maybe include the Astrodome in the movie too and put two aging ladies out of their misery in a spectacular and profitable way.

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On 1/24/2023 at 10:25 PM, Firebird65 said:

Greenspoint Mall's owners need to get with a Hollywood movie studio to use the rotting corpse as a prop in an action movie a la the 1985 Chuck Norris flick Invasion USA. Have terrorists or aliens "attack" the mall and blow it to smithereens. Maybe include the Astrodome in the movie too and put two aging ladies out of their misery in a spectacular and profitable way.

Or a chase scene like the Blues Brothers. Of course that particular mall sat abandoned for over 30 years before finally being demolished about 10 years ago.

Add West Oaks to that list. With the theatre closing, there's literally nothing there except the Fortis School.

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Don't forget Northwest Mall. It's a rotting derelict. Due to poor performance and high vacancy rates, Northwest Mall closed on March 31, 2017.

The last remnant of the mall, Carolyn Thompson's Antique Center, which operated on the first floor of the original JC Penney's anchor, closed on December 31, 2021. The mall is now 100% vacated, abandoned, and awaiting demolition and redevelopment of the site.

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