West Park Mall

The mall was built in 1981 by a partnership between St. Louis-based May Centers, Inc., and Cape Girardeau-based Drury Development Corp., developer of the Drury Hotel Chain,[2][3] It featured Famous-Barr (later Macy's) and JCPenney as its anchor stores, with original tenants including Hallmark Cards, Foot Locker, Kay-Bee Toys, Claire's, Zales Jewelers, GNC, Waldenbooks, and Lerner New York.[4] An 80,000-square-foot (7,400 m²) Venture was added as a third anchor in 1984.[5] Westfield Group bought the mall from CenterMark in 1993, and renamed it Westfield Shoppingtown West Park in 1998.[6]

The Venture store closed in 1998, the same year in which the mall owners proposed adding a fourth anchor store.[7] The West Park Mall Venture store and another at Kentucky Oaks Mall in nearby Paducah, Kentucky both became Shopko in 1999,[8][9] bringing West Park to 100 percent occupancy for the first time in its history.[10] Shopko closed in 2001.[11]

Old Navy opened in the mall in 2004.[12] A year later, the former Venture and Shopko space became Steve & Barry's.[13] In 2006, Westfield sold the mall to Centro Watt (which in 2011 rebranded as Brixmor Property Group), who reverted it to its original name.[14] Barnes & Noble was also added.[15]

Several stores closed in the mall between 2008 and 2010, including Steve & Barry's, Pacific Sunwear, Tilt, (a video arcade that was originally called "The Gold Mine" in the 1980s,) and a restaurant which had been at the mall for 24 years. Despite these vacancies, the mall was 88 percent occupied in 2010, with several of its original stores still in operation.[16] Brixmor hired Madison Marquette to be the manager of the mall in mid-2012.[17]

Ashley Furniture opened in 2018 in the former Venture building.

On January 5, 2021, it was announced that Macy's would be closing as part of a plan to close 46 stores nationwide. The store closed on March 21, 2021.[18]

• Official website