SouthPark opened on February 12, 1970, with anchor stores Belk, Ivey's, and Sears. The area where SouthPark is today was considered to be the on the outskirts of Charlotte at the time it opened; people were skeptical about a big shopping mall in the middle of pastureland. The mall was developed by the Belk and Ivey families, owners of the eponymous department stores, who jointly owned and operated the mall, and included a Sears store as a complement due to its focus on housewares. The mall had approximately when it opened, and the design of the shopping mall was starkly modernist, with an underground parking deck, a signature white brick facade, and tinted windows. The inspiration for the mall's original architecture reportedly was Dallas'NorthPark Center. A strip mall opened behind Sears in June 1970 with a Colonial Stores grocery store and the SouthPark Cinemas I & II. The mall did not face any real competition until the two-story Eastland Mall was built about northeast. Eastland had the same anchor lineup as SouthPark, but also included a JCPenney store and an ice skating rink giving that mall a competitive advantage.
2000s & 2010s expansion
In the late 1990s mall owners announced that upscale retailers Saks Fifth Avenue and Nordstrom would join the mall in SouthPark's biggest expansion yet. In 1995, Belk Brothers Co. became the sole owner of SouthPark by purchasing the remaining 50 percent ownership stake from Ivey Properties. The next year, Belk sold the mall to Rodamco, a Dutch real estate investment fund. The mall was briefly managed by Trammell Crow after the sale. Rodamco soon sold the mall to Simon Property Group. In 2001 and 2002, Belk renovated and expanded its flagship store and Hecht's renovated and expanded its store in 2003 and 2004. The site of the former convenience center and movie theater has been redeveloped into Symphony Park, an outdoor amphitheater and pond, home of a summer concert series called "Pops in the Park." In 2003 Sears, citing under performance, closed their store in the summer of that year, which was eventually demolished to make way for a new outdoor plaza that included a Joseph-Beth Bookstore and a new Galyan's Store. Saks Fifth Avenue pulled out of the expansion, and as of 2020 the company still does not have a Charlotte location, but Nordstrom opened its doors in 2004. This luxury expansion brought exclusive and upscale stores to the area, including Burberry, Louis Vuitton, Hermès, and Tiffany & Co. In late 2005, Simon Property Group announced that Neiman Marcus would be the tenant of the former Saks Fifth Avenue anchor pad, along with another wing of stores & boutiques. Neiman Marcus opened in late 2006. Also, three new parking decks have been added. Dillard's renovated its original 1970s Ivey's facade and interior, the last anchor to update, and Crate & Barrel joined the mall as an outparcel in 2007 in the new Village at SouthPark, which includes street-level retail and restaurants and luxury apartments. Joseph-Beth closed its bookstore in 2010 and The Container Store replaced it in August 2011. On December 6, 2007 at approximately 12:15 PM EST, a portion of the Nordstrom/Neiman Marcus parking deck collapsed. The collapse of the deck was caused by a car colliding with a retaining wall on the third and highest level. Eyewitness accounts stated an elderly woman may have suffered a heart attack, which triggered the accident; the woman died. Two cars were destroyed by the collapsed section of concrete; no one was in either of the cars. At the time, this was the second American parking structure to collapse in two weeks, leading people to question the structural integrity of such buildings. In 2011, a study released by TomTom showed that the area around SouthPark Mall is the most congested shopping area in the United States during Black Friday weekend. American Girl and H&M opened stores opened in the Fall of 2014.
Stores
SouthPark Mall contains 177 stores, making it the largest mall in the Carolinas, and one of the largest by square footage on the East Coast of the United States. The mall is home to the Belk flagship store, the only Neiman Marcus store in the Carolinas, as well as Nordstrom, Dillard's, Dick's Sporting Goods, and Macy's. SouthPark has several upscale stores not found within hundreds of miles from Charlotte, including Louis Vuitton, Burberry, David Yurman, and Tiffany & Co.
