In unfortunate news, Macerich Company-owned Danbury Fair Mall, located in Danbury, Connecticut is currently underway for a proposed renovation plan beginning in January 2007 and to be completed by Spring 2008. The news, a good month old, slipped under my radar, was reported by Bob Chuvala of the local Fairfield Business Journal. This will be a first renovation for the mall, built in 1986, vastly unchanged since. According to the article, the mall is in store for more of a cosmetic than structural overhaul claiming the changing shoppers' habits of staying in malls longer nowadays compared to the 1980's.
Refurbishments will sadly exclude and remove of the center court fountain in favor for a spacious lounge area complete with aerial seating, coffee bar and a scaled-down water display. Brown-shaded tiles will be removed for lighter stone-porcelain flooring, wood-accents along the mid-levels, tan-painted structures along the ceilings, modern lighting fixtures replacing the globe-bulb lighting, and a reorganized food court and restrooms to provide better visibility. As far as the mall's outer-appearance and almost year-vacant Filene's store, "no decision has been made yet on what Macerich will do with the shuttered Filene’s department store, which the company purchased earlier this year, and no renovations are planned right now for the building’s exterior."
While the plan looks very promising and more colorful than that of the insipid white-clad Buckland Hills renovation a few years back, the mall's once distinct look will be going away soon. The Caldor Rainbow will feature a full-spread on the mall with a complete photo gallery shortly before the mall's renovation initiation in January 2007. Refer to the article for a conceptual image of the future of Danbury Fair Mall.
Danbury Fair Mall photograph overlooking center and food court by Nicholas DiMaio, taken August 25, 2006. Photo editing with Picasa.
