Interesting Sights at the Crystal Mall

A shot of the Macy's court

Welcome to another edition of Retail on the Thames. Today we're going to look at some of the more interesting sights at The Crystal Mall in Waterford, Connecticut.

Before we get to the pictures, I would like to say that this post is not going to be an oral history of The Crystal Mall. This post is going to be about some of the stores at the mall that have an interesting history to me. If you want a history of the Crystal Mall, go check out The Caldor Rainbow's post about the mall. Even though that post was made in 2007, there hasn't been any major changes since that post was written except for some interior renovations in the early 2010's, and the unsurprising closure of Sears in January of 2019. Speaking of Sears, let's take a look at it.

 Starting off, here's the main entrance. When you come up to the building, there's no clear labelscars that let you know that this was once a Sears, but just by looking at the building's facade, you can tell that Sears once occupied the space.

I found this unattended Bed Bath and Beyond shopping cart near one of the entrances. When I first encountered the cart, I was hoping that it was a Sears cart, but I was eventually disappointed when I read the label. Normally I don't photograph carts unless their of a chain of yesteryear, but I decided to take a picture of it because it was abandoned and out of the way.

When I was at this particular location, I decided to photograph some of the less looked at objects, such as the lighting and the handicap door opener. One of the things that fascinates me the most when it comes to abandoned places is when they have any extra signage. Even if it isn't store branding, seeing simple signs and stickers makes a vacancy even more fascinating to me

Another thing I'm interested in is locks. While I'm only really into padlocks, seeing this keypad door lock still up was pretty interesting to me

This is one of the side entrances, which almost looks identical to the main entrance. The only difference between the two is that this side entrance has a smaller corridor. As you may be able to notice, the windows here are blacked out. This is the case with all of the windows of this Sears, so I was unable to get any interior shots of it

Lastly for Sears, we have the Auto Center, as well as another side entrance. The Auto Center entrance is the only entrance that looks slightly different. While the store entrances have a slanted facade, the Auto Center entrance faces straight up.

That's it for Sears. Let's look at some more interesting stores

Here's the split anchor of Bed Bath and Beyond and The Christmas Tree Shops. This was originally a Filene's. As some of you may know, Macy's replaced almost all of the May Co. stores in 2006, and at the time, Filene's was recently acquired by Federated, who also owned Macy's. Most of the Filene's in the area were turned into new Macy's because these malls never had a Macy's. However the Crystal Mall already had a Macy's. This was a bit of a problem. Now Macy's could've opened up a Home and Furniture store like the one at the nearby Shoppes at Buckland Hills in Manchester, but for some reason that never happened. This wasn't a big deal because just a few months later, Bed Bath and Beyond and The Christmas Tree Shops each took a floor of the space

The exterior of this location is pretty interesting, because it doesn't look like the typical May Co. exterior that was built in the 80's and 90's. Instead of that basic and slim design, we have this large and bulky structure, with a giant solarium entrance. I was able to find an image of the Filene's at the Maine Mall with a similar exterior, so this build is not one of a kind. Despite that, this building is pretty grand for a former Filene's.

This is EbLens, which used to be a Tweeter, an electronics chain that closed all of their stores in 2008. Tweeter used to be a mini-anchor at the mall. Back when this store was a Tweeter, there was actually outdoor access to the store, but EbLens has since removed the outside entrance, making this tenant only accessible from the mall.

Here's Macy's, which was formerly a Jordan Marsh. For whatever reason I never did a full shoot of the Macy's despite it not being the original tenant. However this Macy's opened up in 1996, and has been a staple at the Crystal Mall for a long time.

JCPenney, which doesn't have any interesting history besides being the only original anchor at the mall.

I figured I would finish off this post by showing a picture of the mall entrance.

That's it for this blog! I hope you really enjoyed this edition, and I'll see you all soon!

-Simpsonfan311