The Enfield Square Mall was so popular back in the 70s. It was beautiful there was this big fountain that you could throw coins in. A large sitting area where everyone could sit down and enjoy. It was the thing to do on Saturdays when going to the mall and shopping and socializing.
This mall was super fun in the late 90s. It had a music store where we bought cassette and later cd singles, an express, a toy store, and a ton of kiosks in the middle. There was even a guy painting peoples portraits with chalk. My mom and a few of her senior citizen friends still walk for exercise there.
I live right near this mall in Mass. I miss walking through this mall. It always felt like a safe place to be as a kid. Enfield CT is fairly safe and the mall was in a great location. So sad to see it gone.
i was just at the mall 3 weeks ago and i was devastated to see the theater gone, it was pretty much the only reason to go besides target and game stop! i saw a lot of marvel movies there in high school ;__;
I remember this being a nice clean little mall with tons of teenagers around late 90’s early 2000’s. I used to work at the Ruby Tuesdays at the Holyoke Mall so I sometimes had to swing by Enfield to pick up supplies for my Manager. The three main Malls I remember going to were Holyoke, Eastfield mall spfld and this one in Enfield.
@@nadinenc3097 yeah its close to where my aunt lives in Spfld. It really had been dead since the very early 2000's. I remember going there in the 80's though and it was pretty good then. I think I recall a KB toy store. That's all I cared about.
@@fleabittenadventures I was visiting family in Mass recently and went to the holyoke mall. Considering the other malls it's doing ok. I mean nowhere near the glory days, but I went around Halloween twice and it was busy both times.
I'm telling ya, Costco moving into our mall here in Champaign IL absolutely saved it and it's always packed on the weekends. I wish more could do the same.
Funny thing is when the Enfield Sq opened next door was the Enfield Mall. That Emptied soon after an closed and was knocked down and conventional shopping center was built. And All the other open air shopping centers surrounding this mall seem to all be doing OK with very few empty store fronts. People prefer to just pull up to store front now and shop at a specific store rather than walking through a Mall.
We wanted the mall saved! Shame shame lettin' a company from across the country come in here gettin' a steal of a deal n us locals are paying for said deal with our tax dollars. This company is an outta state behemoth who goes around destroying malls across the country to put up luxury apartments! Our local government is not doing right by this town with this by far 👎
there are so many mall channels but this one and retail archaeology are my favorite because they seem like home-y vibey retro feeling...very 90s i love it!
merry christmas from australia, thanks for making these videos! they bring a lot of comfort for me and i’m not sure why, our malls are different here but i still get distant nostalgia, i’m just very fascinated by them. you’re great at these videos - i always look forward to what you put out next 😌
This was the mall of my youth. I’m surprised the game stop is still there. I used to eat at the ruby tuesdays regularly back in the early 2000s. At one point that location was an arcade which was always busy.
Dead malls make me sad :( Going to the mall was such a fun experience as a kid. Luckily I live near the Danbury Fair Mall and it’s the furthest thing from dead, we made the genius decision to go 2 days before Christmas and it took half an hour to get around the parking lot to find an open space near the new arcade.
Chess King was a men's clothing chain established in Boston in 1968 by the Melville Corporation. It became a mall staple in the 1970s and 1980s, expanding to over 500 locations by the mid-1980s.
The end of an era indeed. I used to love going to these malls but rarely had time to go to a mall and spend hours. when you can order online or. go to the local big stores. Great video
Great video! I remember going here as a kid. Having to endure trips to Steigers and G Fox. Around back the blue awning part next to Party City is where Radio Shack was.
What is amazing is how the story for many of these malls is very similar. They open to lots of traffic and often two to four anchors depending on size. Then the anchors die and .. *poof*. Like Jefferson Square in Joliet. Opened with Wards and Wieboldt (and a Cinema) as the anchors. I used to walk from home over the railroad tracks to the mall to shop around, visit the food courts, and the gaming place (pinball!). But after only 9 years, Wieboldt's wobbled and finally fell down (sorry, old joke). Oh they tried to fill in that anchor with a Menards (home depot like place). But eventually Menards cut off access directly into the mall (too much theft was the rumor) and that side died. The Cinema went under as people preferred newer large theaters for viewing (and showing second runs of movies was a fools errand with expanding DVD stores). Then Wards of course went belly up. And finally Menards bought what was left, and rebuilt the whole thing into a new Menards Superstore (with some outlier businesses around it). Outlier stores also failed over the years (Sizzler .. where I got my first job .. which died to the health crazes). It seems all malls and businesses are mere snapshots in times, limited items that appear and then fade away....
I saw this mall full of life as a kid, and now as an adult its a hollow shell of what it once was.. Enfield sucks, town officials ran the town to the ground. So many empty buildings, majority of the historical areas destroyed, all for money.
I lived in the neighboring town of Ellington. It's not now but when I was younger it was really a cow town. This mall was the go to for all of us teens from the end of the 70s to mid 80s. We would go there like three times a week because there was little else to do indoors. This place was always jammed packed. You would follow people for a parking spot or have to get dropped off. Sad to see it now.
I worked at the JC Penney after I graduated High School in 1975. Enfield Square used to be THE place to shop in town. The August back to school rush and Christmas were really high traffic times.
We had a mall near me that officially died in 2008, but was taken off life support years earlier. Village Mall in Horsham PA. Small place with only one real anchor, but I remember seeing Jaws there when it released. The line was out the door. Eventually the theatre closed and reopened as a second run theatre. Nice place to catch a movie by yourself since so few people went. It only offered two screens. As a poor college grad I looked forward to Tuesdays and seeing if they had anything new I warned to see. Had a hobby store with games and a bookstore I liked to visit as a kid so every time I stopped in I would walk the length of the mall and pop into them....for old times sake I guess...and still did it even after they closed, but once the theatre shut down for good in 2000 I stopped dropping by. Still sitting there. Kind of a memorial to a brief period in time when we had technology, but before it changed everything about how we shopped and interacted.
Wow. I haven't been here in 20 years. The mall in Springfield, MA was dicey at times and kinda sparse, so more often we'd go to the Enfield mall. Seeing it in this state now is eerie.
I'm not from the US and haven't been there before but I was always fascinated by typical malls as you see them in movies from the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. They seemed to be so full of life and things to do and in many cases (as I can guess from the comments on this video) they were very social spots too with - people meeting there together as teenagers, getting to know new people and so on. It's sad to see that so many malls are slowly dying out. Where I come from such large malls are not very common, we have a few in bigger cities but they are still nothing compared to the ones in the US like in the video. I really wish I could go to one of the big US malls during christmas season - not really to go shopping but to experience the busy atmosphere.
They were "the place to be" if you were a teenager/pre-teen in the 80s and 90s. One of the most annoying things was how far you had to walk to get to the door back then, such a contrast what's shown here. As I got older, there was a point where they became too crowded while others became less safe. That's why I stopped going.
I grew up hanging out and shopping at this mall. I would come here once a week as a teenager back when everyone used it as a chill spot, and shopped here when I was old enough to have my own money. So many memories, very sad. It's just the way it is.
So sad seeing this. I live in western MA and we would visit the Enfield Mall a lot. It was so pretty, smaller but always had such nice stores. I miss those days.
@@fleabittenadventures Very similar to your malls only a lot smaller. You can walk through our local mall in 2 minutes! Only the biggest cities have anything like your malls (and we only have 8 cities).
I moved to this part of the country relatively recently and I pass by where this mall is often. I knew there was kind of a dying mall there but wow…This is the deadest mall I’ve ever seen. I’m kind of fascinated by it. Thanks for sharing. I’m wondering if curiosity will get the best of me and I’ll wander into the target one of these days.
I have no idea if you're even reading this anymore, but I live in Germany, so I've never been to a Target, so I'd be happy about a walk-through. I really enjoy watching your videos.
I grew up spending a lot of time in Enfield where my grandparents lived, I remember begging my grand mother to take us to the arcade there in the 80s and maybe into the 90s... fun fact, there was a second Enfield mall anchored by Bob's Stores, its now a plaza with outward facing stores, but in the 70s and 80s it was an indoor mall, albeit a very small one, and they had great baseball card shows there on Sundays, and another great arcade
Emerald Mall used to be THE mall in the area. During the holiday shopping season I remember having to park in the overflow lot near the Macy's parking garage. Great memories going to Babbages, Electronics Boutique, and Lechmere.
Sad to see this place the way it is now. My friends and I used to go her often in our teens (In the early 2000s), they had a good music shop and a Funcoland, Funcoland was always a treat to visit. It was always a nice change to come here instead of Holyoke mall since you could visit all the stores you wanted without having to walk so much. My girlfriend lives in that area and we went on our first date at that Cinemark(Last year before it closed), she was heartbroken to hear it was closing.
You know what Mall is still going pretty strong that surprises me, North Dartmouth Mall. Been there since before I was born and I’m 38 now and was just there this past week. It’s still always pretty busy and 99% miles f the store fronts are open.
When I was a kid my family and I always used to hit up the Enfield Mall until the 90's when Manchester got the Buckland Hills Mall. Still some good memories of this old place though.
I worked in the KayBee Toys at this mall in the late 80's. Very sad to see it die. It was a great little mall with a comfy, vibrant atmosphere. One of my favorites to visit. I actually did a dead mall tour of duty. From here I went to the Eastfield Mall in Springfield MA, then ended up at the Fairfield Mall in Chicopee. Both great little Malls but are now defunct. 😢
@@fleabittenadventures The best toy store in the Enfield Square was Child World in the 80s. Loved that place as a kid. That was before I had even heard of Toys R Us.
@deaconmikepray9793 I may have bought some of my GI Joe toys from you there as a kid! lol. Another good haunt in that mall was the Nintendo kiosk in the center aisle. Could demo/play all the new games there. It was great.
Thanks for this video. I have been to the Enfield Mall a few times, but the mall closest to me when I was growing up was the Eastfield Mall in Springfield MA. It just closed last year.
Thank you for posting this. I haven't been in the mall since the cinema closed. I miss that mall. Now I have to drive all over the place to do the shopping that I could do in the one mall that was 10 minutes away. So many stores closed in Enfield. We lost the Best Buy that was across the street as well. I was kind of surprised when Panera pulled out in favor of their own building across the street but I guess by that time they weren't getting much traffic. On the other hand if it's so dilapidated that the roof is collapsing it may be beyond economical repair. I knew it was in decline a long time ago though. When one of the letters on the "MACYS" sign on the roof stopped lighting up at night and was never fixed I had an inkling that all was not well. I don't remember what year I noticed that.
I remember the Enfield Square being built in 1971. My dad took me there when the construction workers were digging the foundation. Sad to see it in it’s decline.
Good info. The mall in addition to what you mentioned, also over the years had Radio Shack, Hot topic, Claires, Kay jewlers, Aeropostale, a Day spa, Lenscrafters, dollar tree, Verizon, Sears auto center, a few small bookstores, Liberty tax center, a hair salon, counseling services, GNC, Finish line, I'm sure quite a few more that I forgot.
Used to work at this mall late 90s/early 00’s when there was a Gap there. So sad to see what has happened, and that pizza place is gone now too! I remember it moved to across the cinemas and now it’s something else.
Hey, I work at a vet nearby, and like to walk here during all my lunch breaks when its too hot walk outside. So pretty much every weekday in the Summer I walk this mall so Im very familiar lol! I've occasionally bought a few vintage games at the game store but its been years, haven't spent an actual dime in the mall in forever :/ I will say Ive noticed improvements since the removal of the movie theater
Hobby of mine to walk around malls in different cities, generally good vibes 😎 the massive structures and what it takes to build something like that is impressive the amount of materials into those buildings
Thanks for this video! Hope u dont mind me saying, would be interesting to learn more about downtown & what their plans really are for the that part of town with the train station & how their gonna pull that off ❤ New subscriber 👋
When I was going to Asnuntuck Community College in 1988, I used to be a regular patron at the mall. I bought a book to teach myself the C programming language, at the B. Dalton's. That was by G Fox.I then went to the sub pl;ace that was across from where Game Stop is now (it was Cinnabun then. I saw "Return of the King" at that Cinemark. I remember going through there before COVID, and I think two stores were open, and not even more than I'd say 3 or 4 mall walkers. It was a shock from when I used to move through mass of people that seemed always be there in the 80's and 90's.
Aw this is so sad to see. I grew up going there in the lates 90s - early 2010s, with my Papo ( he actually was a medical dr and surgeon in Somers, before retiring. His name is Dr Arbulu.) bringing me, and my little sister, there too see movies, and go shopping. My first memories of seeing a movie, were there. 🥺 It is heartbreaking to me the theater closed. I wish I had known! I would have made sure to go once more. 😢
Thanks for the detailed video. Had no idea there was a hobby store in there! I will try to give them some business. I shop at that Target and area about 2-3 times a month and never go inside the mall since my kids grew up. Used to walk the mall when they were in a stroller and when they were learning to walk.
I think a lot of mostly dead malls around the USA can take lessons from what happened to Whitney Field Mall in my hometown of Leominster MA. When I was a kid in the 1980s and 1990s, this mall, then known as Searstown, had a lot of small shops and stalls. When it fell on hard times in the early 2000s, it came under new ownership and was renovated extensively. Now it has much larger stores, with each store taking up at least five or six of the old smaller spaces, and many of the old walls between stores were demolished. There are fewer stores, but each store in the mall is now almost as big as the old “anchor stores”. Most of these businesses now have corporate offices as well as retail space, and they have internal mall entrances as well as external doors out to the parking lot, like a drive up strip mall. The inside of the mall is still a place where people hang out and walk/jog as well as shop, and the food court now has full-size dine-in restaurants. Most importantly, there are no more long-term vacant stores. Whenever a store moves out, it is now quickly replaced, as when Macy’s folded in 2020 and a furniture store filled its space within months. Larger stores seem to be what retailers want nowadays, so they can compete with behemoths like Walmart, Target, Kohl’s, and Best Buy, each of which Leominster also has elsewhere in town.
Another path forward for a mostly dead mall is what they did with the Common Outlets in Worcester MA. When I was in high school and undergrad college, I went to this downtown mall to shop for clothes and video games. By the time I graduated from undergrad in 2004, it was still open, but almost every store except the CVS Pharmacy was closed, and the inside seemed like a post-apocalyptic scene. A few years ago, the city bought the old mall and demolished most of the interior spaces, turning it into a walkable outdoor shopping street called “City Square” which emulates the Washington Street area of downtown Boston. A lot of the stores I remember from the mall, like Game Stop and Pizzaria Uno, returned to the area. Interestingly, the original CVS Pharmacy remained in its original space, but it was converted from an internal mall store to a streetside store.
I remember this was one of THE malls to go to. I remember Orange Julius was down by where Sears was in the 70's and into the early 80's. There used to be trees in the main walkway roughly where the diamond patterns are in the tile floor. Nino's Pizza in the 90's last location was where the kebab place is, and their first spot was down by the Target entrance. My grandmother worked at G-Fox for many years and also for a short time after it was Filene's until she retired. As a local, it's a sad thing to see this mall in such decline.
I grew up in Enfield and the mall was the place to be! Back in the 1970's/ 1980's was the best of times for this mall. Would you happen to have any photos and or videos of that time ! It would be so awesome for those to see then and now.
Me too! So sad to see this place hit the skids. Used to walk here in the 70’s from St James Ave right across Elm Street and destroy some Hickory Farm free samples and Orange Julius hot dogs! 🤤
You must be hella young. Gamestop didnt exist back in my day. Software ETC it was called. There was a chain similar to gamestops model... Funcoland... and another decent game retailer... babbages. Back then we had waaaay more options.
@@fleabittenadventures Same. I remember grabbing Dynasty Warriors mid 90s at this mall. I didn't think the series would still be going today back then.
that ssu photo designs store is awesome, got a couple really cool shirts from there. Stateline is a great store too, i been to the one in Buckland mall and they have like every single console
Always sad. Dying malls are taking a lot of nostalgia with them.
The Enfield Square Mall was so popular back in the 70s. It was beautiful there was this big fountain that you could throw coins in. A large sitting area where everyone could sit down and enjoy. It was the thing to do on Saturdays when going to the mall and shopping and socializing.
This mall was super fun in the late 90s. It had a music store where we bought cassette and later cd singles, an express, a toy store, and a ton of kiosks in the middle. There was even a guy painting peoples portraits with chalk. My mom and a few of her senior citizen friends still walk for exercise there.
Cassette singles were the first and they were great
My Uncle Ernie was part of a mall walkers group there in the 90s! Good to hear they still do that
Yes, I remember! I went there a lot between about 1994 and 1998 or so.
I live right near this mall in Mass. I miss walking through this mall. It always felt like a safe place to be as a kid. Enfield CT is fairly safe and the mall was in a great location. So sad to see it gone.
The movie theater closing was brutal! Watched all the last few marvel movies there and the place was rockin!!! People everywhere, great atmosphere
Saw Infinity War there. You'd think the line to the restroom aftetwards was for a funeral viewing.
i was just at the mall 3 weeks ago and i was devastated to see the theater gone, it was pretty much the only reason to go besides target and game stop! i saw a lot of marvel movies there in high school ;__;
It amazes me how many stores, in many Malls, survived the Great Recession but crashed between 2016 to 2020.
2020 seems to have done the most damage from what I can tell.
Amazon didn't help. Although it was fun going to the mall and seeing different people, and things that were for sale.
HATE SHOPPING ONLINE! RIP ENFIELD MALL 😢
Thats my mall. Wild to see it on YT
I remember this being a nice clean little mall with tons of teenagers around late 90’s early 2000’s. I used to work at the Ruby Tuesdays at the Holyoke Mall so I sometimes had to swing by Enfield to pick up supplies for my Manager. The three main Malls I remember going to were Holyoke, Eastfield mall spfld and this one in Enfield.
Holyoke's really the only one hanging on at this point. I miss that Ruby Tuesdays.
I worked at Payless at 18 right outta high school. It was a great place to work, really was.
The East field Mall was just torn down.
@@nadinenc3097 yeah its close to where my aunt lives in Spfld. It really had been dead since the very early 2000's. I remember going there in the 80's though and it was pretty good then. I think I recall a KB toy store. That's all I cared about.
@@fleabittenadventures I was visiting family in Mass recently and went to the holyoke mall. Considering the other malls it's doing ok. I mean nowhere near the glory days, but I went around Halloween twice and it was busy both times.
I'm telling ya, Costco moving into our mall here in Champaign IL absolutely saved it and it's always packed on the weekends. I wish more could do the same.
There's a Costco about 5 minutes from the mall, so that's not going to happen here, sadly.
@@fleabittenadventures 90 secconds.
Costco is across the street from this Mall. There is several shopping plaza’s within a 1 mile radius of this mall all doing pretty good.
Funny thing is when the Enfield Sq opened next door was the Enfield Mall. That Emptied soon after an closed and was knocked down and conventional shopping center was built. And All the other open air shopping centers surrounding this mall seem to all be doing OK with very few empty store fronts. People prefer to just pull up to store front now and shop at a specific store rather than walking through a Mall.
We wanted the mall saved! Shame shame lettin' a company from across the country come in here gettin' a steal of a deal n us locals are paying for said deal with our tax dollars. This company is an outta state behemoth who goes around destroying malls across the country to put up luxury apartments! Our local government is not doing right by this town with this by far 👎
there are so many mall channels but this one and retail archaeology are my favorite because they seem like home-y vibey retro feeling...very 90s i love it!
Thanks!
Merry Christmas from Australia. I really enjoy your views.
grilled wombat is outstanding
Thanks! Merry Christmas to you too!
👋 Australia ❤
merry christmas from australia, thanks for making these videos! they bring a lot of comfort for me and i’m not sure why, our malls are different here but i still get distant nostalgia, i’m just very fascinated by them. you’re great at these videos - i always look forward to what you put out next 😌
👋 Australia ❤
This was the mall of my youth. I’m surprised the game stop is still there. I used to eat at the ruby tuesdays regularly back in the early 2000s. At one point that location was an arcade which was always busy.
Thank you for this video. You saved me a trip to this hideous location.
Dead malls make me sad :( Going to the mall was such a fun experience as a kid. Luckily I live near the Danbury Fair Mall and it’s the furthest thing from dead, we made the genius decision to go 2 days before Christmas and it took half an hour to get around the parking lot to find an open space near the new arcade.
Used to be a Chess King there somewhere. I remember shopping there. Many, many moons ago ;). Thanks for posting this Tom
Really? What's Chess King? Thanks for watching!
Chess King was a men's clothing chain established in Boston in 1968 by the Melville Corporation. It became a mall staple in the 1970s and 1980s, expanding to over 500 locations by the mid-1980s.
The end of an era indeed. I used to love going to these malls but rarely had time to go to a mall and spend hours. when you can order online or. go to the local big stores. Great video
Great video! I remember going here as a kid. Having to endure trips to Steigers and G Fox. Around back the blue awning part next to Party City is where Radio Shack was.
Yes! I remember the Radio Shack as I used to go there. I missed Steiger's though. That closed before I started going to this mall.
Woah, this is scary xD I went to enfield square mall for the first time yesterday and just now, im seeing this video in my recommendations o.o
What is amazing is how the story for many of these malls is very similar. They open to lots of traffic and often two to four anchors depending on size. Then the anchors die and .. *poof*. Like Jefferson Square in Joliet. Opened with Wards and Wieboldt (and a Cinema) as the anchors. I used to walk from home over the railroad tracks to the mall to shop around, visit the food courts, and the gaming place (pinball!). But after only 9 years, Wieboldt's wobbled and finally fell down (sorry, old joke). Oh they tried to fill in that anchor with a Menards (home depot like place). But eventually Menards cut off access directly into the mall (too much theft was the rumor) and that side died. The Cinema went under as people preferred newer large theaters for viewing (and showing second runs of movies was a fools errand with expanding DVD stores). Then Wards of course went belly up. And finally Menards bought what was left, and rebuilt the whole thing into a new Menards Superstore (with some outlier businesses around it). Outlier stores also failed over the years (Sizzler .. where I got my first job .. which died to the health crazes). It seems all malls and businesses are mere snapshots in times, limited items that appear and then fade away....
I saw this mall full of life as a kid, and now as an adult its a hollow shell of what it once was.. Enfield sucks, town officials ran the town to the ground. So many empty buildings, majority of the historical areas destroyed, all for money.
Same thing in my city!
What you mean with "historical areas"?
Democrat run cities fail
Democratic policies most likely.
@tomservo5607 I'm in Connecticut, blue state shit hole...
I lived in the neighboring town of Ellington. It's not now but when I was younger it was really a cow town. This mall was the go to for all of us teens from the end of the 70s to mid 80s. We would go there like three times a week because there was little else to do indoors. This place was always jammed packed. You would follow people for a parking spot or have to get dropped off. Sad to see it now.
One of my most favorite and memorable malls,, I always loved the music,,, great to dance along the halls.. :)
I get it, but music playing at the malls is a TH-camr's number one enemy.
Thanks!
Thank you very much! I really appreciate it!
Thanks for the upload !! The sears was the original stigers.
Reminds me of places I explore in my dreams.
Great mall in the 70s and 80s. Nice stores and the right size, not too big.
One of the reasons I really liked going to the Enfield Mall was it was not as big as say Westfarms so it was a much nicer shopping experience:)
I worked at the JC Penney after I graduated High School in 1975. Enfield Square used to be THE place to shop in town. The August back to school rush and Christmas were really high traffic times.
Those were the days.
Remember going there as a young kid in the late 70’s. Sad to see
We had a mall near me that officially died in 2008, but was taken off life support years earlier. Village Mall in Horsham PA. Small place with only one real anchor, but I remember seeing Jaws there when it released. The line was out the door. Eventually the theatre closed and reopened as a second run theatre. Nice place to catch a movie by yourself since so few people went. It only offered two screens. As a poor college grad I looked forward to Tuesdays and seeing if they had anything new I warned to see. Had a hobby store with games and a bookstore I liked to visit as a kid so every time I stopped in I would walk the length of the mall and pop into them....for old times sake I guess...and still did it even after they closed, but once the theatre shut down for good in 2000 I stopped dropping by. Still sitting there. Kind of a memorial to a brief period in time when we had technology, but before it changed everything about how we shopped and interacted.
The closure of Party City is gonna kill this mall.
As if it really brought in that much business to begin with
why? people get that stuff from target and dollar stores anyway.
@@mst3kpimp yeah, Target might pretty much be the only major tenant after Party City closes.
Nobody went there though. Every time I went by there, it was always empty
@@AWB-Official-u1bthe people that own the mall don’t own target.
Glad that GameStop is still there, also remember Kay B Toys.
Wow. I haven't been here in 20 years. The mall in Springfield, MA was dicey at times and kinda sparse, so more often we'd go to the Enfield mall. Seeing it in this state now is eerie.
Yes, at its height, I would say Enfield Square mall was a much nicer mall than Eastfield Mall.
The snow looks magical! ❄️
I thought so too!
I'm not from the US and haven't been there before but I was always fascinated by typical malls as you see them in movies from the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. They seemed to be so full of life and things to do and in many cases (as I can guess from the comments on this video) they were very social spots too with - people meeting there together as teenagers, getting to know new people and so on. It's sad to see that so many malls are slowly dying out.
Where I come from such large malls are not very common, we have a few in bigger cities but they are still nothing compared to the ones in the US like in the video. I really wish I could go to one of the big US malls during christmas season - not really to go shopping but to experience the busy atmosphere.
They were "the place to be" if you were a teenager/pre-teen in the 80s and 90s. One of the most annoying things was how far you had to walk to get to the door back then, such a contrast what's shown here. As I got older, there was a point where they became too crowded while others became less safe. That's why I stopped going.
Thank you for this very interesting video. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
Thanks, you too!
Yes! Can you do please Christmas 2025 Mall.
Used to go to the arcade there as a kid. Many memories in that mall.
Love your expertise and background knowledge of these malls! Please keep going! 😊
Thanks! Glad you like the videos!
I grew up hanging out and shopping at this mall. I would come here once a week as a teenager back when everyone used it as a chill spot, and shopped here when I was old enough to have my own money. So many memories, very sad. It's just the way it is.
Eastfield Mall in Mass was the place to go during Christmas as a child and I shopped here in the 70's and 80's.
So sad seeing this. I live in western MA and we would visit the Enfield Mall a lot. It was so pretty, smaller but always had such nice stores. I miss those days.
Yyyeeeeeesssssss!!! Please do a walk through the Target!!! Would love to see it!! Thank you 😊
Very interesting video. Glad I found your channel. Our malls are also in decline here in Scotland. Their best days are behind them.
I'm glad you found my channel too! What do they malls look like in Scotland? Are they similar to our malls? I honestly don't know. Thanks.
@@fleabittenadventures Very similar to your malls only a lot smaller. You can walk through our local mall in 2 minutes! Only the biggest cities have anything like your malls (and we only have 8 cities).
I moved to this part of the country relatively recently and I pass by where this mall is often. I knew there was kind of a dying mall there but wow…This is the deadest mall I’ve ever seen. I’m kind of fascinated by it. Thanks for sharing. I’m wondering if curiosity will get the best of me and I’ll wander into the target one of these days.
Dead malls fascinate me too, but you probably could have guessed that.
I have no idea if you're even reading this anymore, but I live in Germany, so I've never been to a Target, so I'd be happy about a walk-through. I really enjoy watching your videos.
I loved that mall since going there in the early 90s
I grew up in Suffield. This mall was my childhood. So sad to see it now 😢
Lots of great information about the mall and its possible fate. Thanks
Thanks! It's my local dead mall so I've been keeping track of it for a while.
@@fleabittenadventures same
Kebab House and Mosaic are the same people, AFAIK. I grab food there sometimes and they walk back and forth between the two restaurants.
I just saw a video about turning dead mall stores into apartments - what a cool idea! I don't want to shop in the mall -unless I live there!!
I grew up spending a lot of time in Enfield where my grandparents lived, I remember begging my grand mother to take us to the arcade there in the 80s and maybe into the 90s... fun fact, there was a second Enfield mall anchored by Bob's Stores, its now a plaza with outward facing stores, but in the 70s and 80s it was an indoor mall, albeit a very small one, and they had great baseball card shows there on Sundays, and another great arcade
Memories..........❤
In the 1970s we would go there for the flea market every sunday
@stevelucia223
It was still going on in the 80's!
@@stevelucia223 yes! That’s what I remember, begging my grandma to buy me a Cal Ripken rookie card
Emerald Mall used to be THE mall in the area. During the holiday shopping season I remember having to park in the overflow lot near the Macy's parking garage. Great memories going to Babbages, Electronics Boutique, and Lechmere.
I really like the plan that they might have happen. Wonder if it will happen and when.
I’m glad you did! They might’ve put up that sign because they saw your other videos. 😂
This has gotten me into the Christmas Spirit.
Sad to see this place the way it is now. My friends and I used to go her often in our teens (In the early 2000s), they had a good music shop and a Funcoland, Funcoland was always a treat to visit. It was always a nice change to come here instead of Holyoke mall since you could visit all the stores you wanted without having to walk so much. My girlfriend lives in that area and we went on our first date at that Cinemark(Last year before it closed), she was heartbroken to hear it was closing.
I used to love Funco land! I bought every single Sega 32x Game for I think $1 a cartridge!
I grew up near here we, I remember going Christmas with my grandparents here with all the original anchor stores
You know what Mall is still going pretty strong that surprises me, North Dartmouth Mall. Been there since before I was born and I’m 38 now and was just there this past week. It’s still always pretty busy and 99% miles f the store fronts are open.
If you ever head down south come check out Valley Hills Mall in Hickory , NC I truly believe it’s a dying mall ! Your videos are great !!
Yes please target walkthrough!
When I was a kid my family and I always used to hit up the Enfield Mall until the 90's when Manchester got the Buckland Hills Mall. Still some good memories of this old place though.
I worked in the KayBee Toys at this mall in the late 80's. Very sad to see it die. It was a great little mall with a comfy, vibrant atmosphere. One of my favorites to visit. I actually did a dead mall tour of duty. From here I went to the Eastfield Mall in Springfield MA, then ended up at the Fairfield Mall in Chicopee. Both great little Malls but are now defunct. 😢
Was the Kaybee near where Second Floor Games is today?
@@fleabittenadventures I believe so but my memory is a bit fuzzy now on its location.
Kb was across from the CVS
@@fleabittenadventures The best toy store in the Enfield Square was Child World in the 80s. Loved that place as a kid. That was before I had even heard of Toys R Us.
@deaconmikepray9793 I may have bought some of my GI Joe toys from you there as a kid! lol. Another good haunt in that mall was the Nintendo kiosk in the center aisle. Could demo/play all the new games there. It was great.
i PERMANENTLY really really LOVE you tube ALMOST as much as being a CUSTOMER at malls
Happy holidays🎅🎄🎀
You too!
Sad my family would make trips to the "Enfield Mall" (as we called it) all the time in the 80's. So many memories wathcing you walk this place.
Thanks for this video. I have been to the Enfield Mall a few times, but the mall closest to me when I was growing up was the Eastfield Mall in Springfield MA. It just closed last year.
Yes, I did three videos at Eastfield. One on the last day it was open. Check those out!
Thank you for posting this. I haven't been in the mall since the cinema closed. I miss that mall. Now I have to drive all over the place to do the shopping that I could do in the one mall that was 10 minutes away. So many stores closed in Enfield. We lost the Best Buy that was across the street as well. I was kind of surprised when Panera pulled out in favor of their own building across the street but I guess by that time they weren't getting much traffic. On the other hand if it's so dilapidated that the roof is collapsing it may be beyond economical repair.
I knew it was in decline a long time ago though. When one of the letters on the "MACYS" sign on the roof stopped lighting up at night and was never fixed I had an inkling that all was not well. I don't remember what year I noticed that.
Im an Enfield resident and this place is an eyesore.
Merry Christmas to you and everyone else Flea and this was great for tonight thank you 🌲🎅🧑🎄🌲
Glad you liked it! Thanks for watching!
I remember the Enfield Square being built in 1971. My dad took me there when the construction workers were digging the foundation. Sad to see it in it’s decline.
Cool! I wish I could have seen it back then!
Good info. The mall in addition to what you mentioned, also over the years had Radio Shack, Hot topic, Claires, Kay jewlers, Aeropostale, a Day spa, Lenscrafters, dollar tree, Verizon, Sears auto center, a few small bookstores, Liberty tax center, a hair salon, counseling services, GNC, Finish line, I'm sure quite a few more that I forgot.
Sad to see it fading even further. It sucks to see all these malls slowly wasting away.
That movie theater closing definitely hurt, still take the kiddo for walks through there on rainy days but it’s gotten pretty rough.
Used to work at this mall late 90s/early 00’s when there was a Gap there. So sad to see what has happened, and that pizza place is gone now too! I remember it moved to across the cinemas and now it’s something else.
Merry Christmas to you and your mother, Tom!
Same to you! Thanks!
Thank you, enjoyed the walk thru.
Thanks for watching!
Hey, I work at a vet nearby, and like to walk here during all my lunch breaks when its too hot walk outside. So pretty much every weekday in the Summer I walk this mall so Im very familiar lol! I've occasionally bought a few vintage games at the game store but its been years, haven't spent an actual dime in the mall in forever :/ I will say Ive noticed improvements since the removal of the movie theater
Hobby of mine to walk around malls in different cities, generally good vibes 😎 the massive structures and what it takes to build something like that is impressive the amount of materials into those buildings
Hi Tom it’s Rena I would like it if you could do a walkthrough of the Target store that sounds great to me! Thank you for another great video! 😊😊😊😊😊😊
Thanks! I'll see what I can do!
America is full of abandoned malls and many more are closing soon, while other countries in the world are building new malls like crazy.
True,,in russia,malls are packed.
I grew up in Enfield in the 90’s and the mall used to be our home away from home. It’s so sad to see it end up like this.
Merry Christmas! I wish that I could be a mall traveler 😻
Merry Christmas to you too!
Geez, I bet you'll have some Backrooms material in January.
Thanks for the video!!!
For sure! Thanks for watching!
2:45 Shout-out to the massage chairs
Interesting to see so many hobby/game/collectibles stores in one hallway.
Thanks for this video! Hope u dont mind me saying, would be interesting to learn more about downtown & what their plans really are for the that part of town with the train station & how their gonna pull that off ❤ New subscriber 👋
When I was going to Asnuntuck Community College in 1988, I used to be a regular patron at the mall. I bought a book to teach myself the C programming language, at the B. Dalton's. That was by G Fox.I then went to the sub pl;ace that was across from where Game Stop is now (it was Cinnabun then.
I saw "Return of the King" at that Cinemark.
I remember going through there before COVID, and I think two stores were open, and not even more than I'd say 3 or 4 mall walkers. It was a shock from when I used to move through mass of people that seemed always be there in the 80's and 90's.
Aw this is so sad to see. I grew up going there in the lates 90s - early 2010s, with my Papo ( he actually was a medical dr and surgeon in Somers, before retiring. His name is Dr Arbulu.) bringing me, and my little sister, there too see movies, and go shopping.
My first memories of seeing a movie, were there. 🥺
It is heartbreaking to me the theater closed. I wish I had known! I would have made sure to go once more. 😢
Going there was such a treat when I was a kid with orange Julius childworld and the pizza joint there
Thanks for the detailed video. Had no idea there was a hobby store in there! I will try to give them some business. I shop at that Target and area about 2-3 times a month and never go inside the mall since my kids grew up. Used to walk the mall when they were in a stroller and when they were learning to walk.
I think a lot of mostly dead malls around the USA can take lessons from what happened to Whitney Field Mall in my hometown of Leominster MA. When I was a kid in the 1980s and 1990s, this mall, then known as Searstown, had a lot of small shops and stalls. When it fell on hard times in the early 2000s, it came under new ownership and was renovated extensively. Now it has much larger stores, with each store taking up at least five or six of the old smaller spaces, and many of the old walls between stores were demolished. There are fewer stores, but each store in the mall is now almost as big as the old “anchor stores”.
Most of these businesses now have corporate offices as well as retail space, and they have internal mall entrances as well as external doors out to the parking lot, like a drive up strip mall. The inside of the mall is still a place where people hang out and walk/jog as well as shop, and the food court now has full-size dine-in restaurants. Most importantly, there are no more long-term vacant stores. Whenever a store moves out, it is now quickly replaced, as when Macy’s folded in 2020 and a furniture store filled its space within months. Larger stores seem to be what retailers want nowadays, so they can compete with behemoths like Walmart, Target, Kohl’s, and Best Buy, each of which Leominster also has elsewhere in town.
My wife was probably in that Target while you were filming.
Another path forward for a mostly dead mall is what they did with the Common Outlets in Worcester MA. When I was in high school and undergrad college, I went to this downtown mall to shop for clothes and video games. By the time I graduated from undergrad in 2004, it was still open, but almost every store except the CVS Pharmacy was closed, and the inside seemed like a post-apocalyptic scene. A few years ago, the city bought the old mall and demolished most of the interior spaces, turning it into a walkable outdoor shopping street called “City Square” which emulates the Washington Street area of downtown Boston. A lot of the stores I remember from the mall, like Game Stop and Pizzaria Uno, returned to the area. Interestingly, the original CVS Pharmacy remained in its original space, but it was converted from an internal mall store to a streetside store.
I remember this was one of THE malls to go to. I remember Orange Julius was down by where Sears was in the 70's and into the early 80's. There used to be trees in the main walkway roughly where the diamond patterns are in the tile floor. Nino's Pizza in the 90's last location was where the kebab place is, and their first spot was down by the Target entrance. My grandmother worked at G-Fox for many years and also for a short time after it was Filene's until she retired. As a local, it's a sad thing to see this mall in such decline.
I grew up in Enfield and the mall was the place to be! Back in the 1970's/ 1980's was the best of times for this mall. Would you happen to have any photos and or videos of that time ! It would be so awesome for those to see then and now.
Me too! So sad to see this place hit the skids. Used to walk here in the 70’s from St James Ave right across Elm Street and destroy some Hickory Farm free samples and Orange Julius hot dogs! 🤤
Stay safe thanks for making another video
Thank you!
I remember malls in the 80's were packed with shoppers during Christmas week.
Yes! Can you do please Bed, Bath and Beyond opening in 2025.
3:17 Stateline Video Games moved to the Holyoke Mall. They have a store on both floors above the food court.
that gamestop built my childhood lol
You must be hella young. Gamestop didnt exist back in my day. Software ETC it was called. There was a chain similar to gamestops model... Funcoland... and another decent game retailer... babbages. Back then we had waaaay more options.
I remember when Gamestop was still Electronics Boutique, then EB Games, then Gamestop.
@@fleabittenadventures Same. I remember grabbing Dynasty Warriors mid 90s at this mall. I didn't think the series would still be going today back then.
that ssu photo designs store is awesome, got a couple really cool shirts from there. Stateline is a great store too, i been to the one in Buckland mall and they have like every single console