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 South Exterior | |
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| Location | City of Industry, California |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 33°59′37″N117°55′39″W / 33.99356°N 117.92750°W /33.99356; -117.92750 |
| Opening date | 1974 |
| Developer | The Hahn Company |
| Owner | Kam Sang Company |
| Stores and services | 155 |
| Anchor tenants | 7 (5 open, 2 vacant)[1] |
| Floor area | 1,100,000 sq ft (100,000 m2)[2] |
| Floors | 2 |
Puente Hills Mall, located inCity of Industry, California, United States, is a major regionalshopping center in theSan Gabriel Valley region ofLos Angeles County. It is most famous for serving as the filming site for the Twin Pines/Lone Pine Mall for the 1985 movieBack to the Future starringMichael J. Fox andChristopher Lloyd. Anchor stores areBurlington,Macy's, andRoss Dress For Less.
Puente Hills Mall was opened in phases over a year from February 1974 through Spring 1975, after the completion of thePomona Freeway a few years earlier.
The first anchor to open, on February 18, 1974, wasThe Broadway, with three levels and 160,000 square feet.J.W. Robinson's followed, opening in March.Sears followed, and by March 1975 the mall had about 150 shops open.JCPenney opened on April 16, 1975.[3][4] By September 1975 the mall reported 152 shops open and announced plans for construction of an adjacent 41-acre auto mall and home improvement and home furnishings retail district.[5]
The mall has a cross-shaped design and was developed byThe Hahn Company.
In 1993, J.W. Robinson's rebranded asRobinsons-May, after the chain merged withMay Company. In 1996, two anchor stores, The Broadway (at the time purchased byMacy's) and JCPenney, were closed. At the time of JCPenney's departure, the mall was at about 50% occupancy.[6] The mall was extensively renovated afterwards and features a 20-screenAMC Theatresmegaplex, and stores traditionally found inpower centers such as24 Hour Fitness andBurlington Coat Factory, in addition to the remaining two original anchors, Robinsons-May and Sears.Ross Dress for Less,Circuit City,Linens 'n Things, Spectrum Club, Burlington Coat Factory,Borders, andCompUSA all opened in 1998.
In September 2006, Borders closed while Robinsons-May rebranded as Macy's, afterFederated purchasedThe May Department Stores Company in 2005. Linens 'n Things, Circuit City, and CompUSA all closed their locations at the mall in 2008 and 2009. Circuit City and CompUSA had both gone bankrupt while Linens 'n Things was closed as part of a strategy to focus on online shopping. On August 28, 2010, the Japanese sports entertainment chain Round1 opened the first U.S. location ofRound1 Bowling & Amusement, a video game arcade and bowling alley, as a new anchor. It was the company's first overseas store, replacing Linens 'n Things.
The center of the mall previously featured a large cubed water fountain, then amerry-go-round attraction built in 1990, but it was later removed by the mall's owners, Krausz Companies, as they were losing money in its operation. An East Asian-stylekoi pond replaced the carousel, but was removed as of 2006. The koi were moved to Sycamore Lake at Rose Hills Memorial Park in Whittier. The mall underwent a full interior makeover in 2007 after the removal of the koi pond.
Due to the large and influential Asian immigrant populations residing and/or operating businesses in nearby areas (notably in Industry, Hacienda Heights, Rowland Heights, Walnut, and Diamond Bar), some redesigns of the mall incorporatedfeng shui principles.[7]
Toys "R" Us opened in June 2011, taking the spot previously occupied by Circuit City. Toys "R" Us had formerly been located at the Plaza at Puente Hills on Gale Avenue in Industry. It closed along with all Toys 'R' Us stores in early 2018, shutting down on April 15, 2018.[8]
On May 31, 2018, it was announced that Sears would be closing as part of a plan to close 72 stores nationwide. The store closed in September 2018.[9]
On December 1, 2019, Forever 21 announced it would close the Puente Hills Mall store along with 21 other locations in California & 90 stores nationwide. The store closed in January 2020.[10]
On January 5, 2022, Macy's announced that their Puente Hills Mall anchor would be closed in the first financial quarter of 2022.[11] The store closed on March, with Burlington slated to close on March 22, 2024; leaving Round 1 and AMC as the final two remaining anchors in the mall.[citation needed]
Puente Hills Mall served as a filming location for the fictional Twin Pines Mall (later Lone Pine Mall) in the 1985 filmBack to the Future. In the film,Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd) uses the mall's south parking lot (visible in the above photograph) to stage his time travel experiments with theDeLorean time machine. The JCPenney and Robinson's stores feature prominently in the background. J.C Penney closed this location on October 1996. A Ross Dress for Less store can be seen in a strip mall across the street. The scenes were filmed in January 1985. According to theDVDaudio commentary, screenplay writerBob Gale says that, three months after the theatrical release, several fans gathered at the Puente Hills Mall in the early hours of October 26, 1985, the date given in the film as thepresent day, to see if anything would happen.
Puente Hills Mall featured replicas of the Twin Pines Mall sign, the time machine, and Dr. E. Brown Enterprises truck in its parking lot in October 2015.[12]