Solano Town Center opens with anchors
Fairfield, 1981. A new mall went up on Travis Blvd, its smooth concrete almost white in the sun, its glass doors prepared for the weekend rush.
The two-level structure opened as Solano Mall, enclosed and air-conditioned, built to draw shoppers from the entire Solano County area.
Right from the beginning, the anchors were set: The Emporium, JCPenney, Sears. Each one went all in, opening a full-scale department store on site.
The Emporium connected the project to a longer Bay Area retail history, offering clothing and home goods to families settling nearby.
JCPenney filled its floors with everyday apparel and furnishings.
Sears operated a large store with hardware, appliances, and catalog orders, serving the region's growing suburbs.
Anchored by the major stores, the in-between spaces belonged to smaller players: shoes, vinyl, clothing.
Two stacked levels were tied together by escalators, and beyond the walls, asphalt fields spread wide to swallow the weekend influx.
By the end of its first year, Solano Mall was fully operational, its stores open daily and its corridors busy from morning through evening.
The project gave Fairfield a commercial core of its own, positioned beside I-80 and built to serve a county that was still finding its suburban center.
Westfield buys in and reshapes the boxes
In 1998, Westfield America bought the property and folded it into its national portfolio, adding its brand to the mall's signage.
The new owner renamed it Westfield Shoppingtown Solano and began internal updates meant to streamline circulation and expand draw.
At the same time, Sears relocated into the former Emporium building, leaving its original box empty for redevelopment.
The two-level shell of that first Sears became a construction site, with its upper floor converted for an Edwards Cinemas complex that opened in May 1999.
Best Buy moved into the lower level around 2000, marking the end of construction on a split concept that housed electronics beneath the movie complex.
The cinema debuted with a 16-screen format, stadium seating, and first-run films that immediately drove weekend traffic.
Afterward, Westfield continued leasing and positioned the mall as the regional destination between the Bay Area and Sacramento.
By 2005, the company shortened the name to Westfield Solano, aligning with its other U.S. centers.
The mall's anchor mix was balanced across retail and entertainment, signaling a shift from a department-store format to a multiuse retail core.
Fifth anchor turnover resets the mix
When Mervyn's closed in 2008, the two-level store it left behind went quiet, its wide doors locked and its escalators still.
Two years later, Forever 21 took over the upper floor, filling the space with racks of fast-fashion clothing and loud pop music that carried through the halls.
In 2011, Sports Authority opened below, turning the lower level into a warehouse of sneakers, tents, and treadmills under bright fluorescent light.
Each store kept its own entrance.
Shoppers on one floor looked for clothes; downstairs, they tried out bikes or browsed golf clubs.
For a while, both stores held steady, keeping the building busy and restoring life to a corner of the mall that had gone dark.
Sports Authority's bankruptcy in 2016 ended that run, closing the store and leaving the lower level vacant once again.
In September 2017, Dick's Sporting Goods opened in the same space, bringing a new anchor to replace it.
Forever 21 would close later during its company downsizing, but by the end of 2017, Solano Town Center had filled its anchor lineup again, trading one set of national names for another while keeping the corridors busy on weekends.
Sale and a new name on the doors
In April 2012, ownership of the Fairfield mall changed when Westfield finalized its sale to Starwood Capital Group, transferring management and control of the property.
Later that year, the mall received a new identity.
By November 2012, the red Westfield lettering that had topped the entrances for years was replaced with new signs reading Solano Town Center.
Operations inside continued without pause.
Tenants opened on schedule, anchor stores kept regular hours, and foot traffic remained steady through the transition.
Starwood retained the existing two-level structure, covering roughly a million square feet of enclosed retail space with parking fields on all sides.
Rather than remodel, the new owner reintroduced the mall under a name that connected it directly to Solano County, separating it from the broader Westfield portfolio.
Sears spins off, then exits the stage
In 2015, Sears Holdings separated hundreds of its stores into a new company, Seritage Growth Properties, including the Sears inside Solano Town Center.
The move shifted ownership of the property while Sears continued to operate as a tenant under a lease agreement with the new firm.
For three more years, the store traded as usual, running seasonal sales and appliance events inside the two-level box once built for Emporium-Capwell.
By spring 2018, Sears Holdings listed the Fairfield location among the next wave of closures in its nationwide restructuring plan.
Liquidation signs went up, and inventory clearance ran through the summer, ending with the final day of business in late July 2018.
When the gates closed, the building joined a growing list of empty Sears anchors across the country, leaving another large vacancy inside the mall.
By the end of that year, Solano Town Center operated with one less department store, while its other anchors: Macy's, JCPenney, Dick's Sporting Goods, and the Edwards cinema remained active.
The property stayed fully open, its largest dark space awaiting redevelopment.
Entertainment play delayed, then lands
After Sears closed, the mall needed something new to fill the empty anchor.
Dave & Buster's signed on for the space, and construction started soon after.
They stripped the old department store clean, pulling floors and walls until only an empty box remained.
Then, right as progress picked up, early 2020 hit, and statewide restrictions shut the work down.
For months, the lights stayed off and the work sat unfinished.
The outlines of a restaurant and arcade waited behind closed doors.
Then, the crews showed up again and got busy.
Kitchen gear went in first, then wiring for the arcade, then screens across the walls.
Little by little, the space stopped feeling like a store.
You could finally see what it was turning into: an entertainment center.
Dave & Buster's opened in May 2021, the company's first location in Solano County.
It brought food, games, and sports to a part of the mall that had been empty for years.
Families filled the booths. The sound of machines mixed with voices from the bar.
Across the concourse, the Regal Edwards theater stayed busy late into the night.
By the end of 2021, that corner of Solano Town Center was back in use, alive with noise and light where Sears once stood quiet.
New owner, fresh food pads, and mixed signals
In October 2023, Spinoso Real Estate Group acquired Solano Town Center, taking over ownership and management from Starwood Capital Group.
The company listed the mall's gross leasable area at just over one million square feet, with anchors Macy's, JCPenney, Dick's Sporting Goods, Regal Cinemas, Dave & Buster's, and Best Buy.
Earlier that same year, Jollibee opened inside the complex, confirming the chain's first Fairfield location with a May 5 launch date.
In 2024, construction wrapped on a Raising Cane's drive-thru at 1360 Travis Blvd, noted in commercial listings as part of the Solano Town Center property.
That spring, California Forever opened a temporary storefront office inside the mall to share information about its proposed regional development plan.
The site also saw a violent parking lot incident in November 2024 that led to an arrest and renewed discussion of mall safety among local outlets.
By mid-2025, a new Starbucks and a POP MART vending store joined the trade area, keeping retail churn active under Spinoso's management while the mall's core operations remained steady and open.