The rise and reinvention of Coastland Center in Naples, FL, the mall that asked for a fifth department store

In 1992 the owners of Coastland Center asked the city for room to grow to five department stores. The city struck the fifth from the plan.

The four it had kept went on trading, some under new signs. Maas Brothers became Burdines, then Macy's. Robinson's became Maison Blanche, then Dillard's. Sears held its corner until 2018, and in 2019 its building came down.

The price moved faster than the signs. In 2012 the mall's main property, the share pledged against its loan, was appraised at $233 million. In February 2024 the same property came in at $77.4 million.

That March, tenants had signed for 96 percent of its space. Nearly every storefront had a tenant, on a property worth a fraction of its old price. That leaves the stores behind those storefronts, and how they stand today.

Maas Brothers opened before the mall did

The woods across the road from Naples High School came down in 1976.

On that cleared tract, Coastland Center opened in 1977 as an enclosed mall at 1900 Tamiami Trail North in Naples, Florida, though it did not open all on one day.

Maas Brothers came first.

The department store opened on February 3, 1977, and had the site to itself until Sears opened its store on July 27.

The corridor that would join them, a single-level hallway bent into an L, did not open until September 28, so for two months Coastland was two large stores standing apart on fresh ground, with nothing covered between them.

Naples had not had a conventional mall of its own before then.

Shoppers who wanted one drove to Edison Mall in Fort Myers.

Once the L opened, smaller shops took space along it, and by early 1978 a Radio Shack was trading in the new corridor.

Four department stores and a run of new names

The L grew east in 1985.

JCPenney opened on the east side on February 6, and Robinson's of Florida beside it on October 20, and by the end of the year the work had added 45 stores.

A mall built around two anchors had become a regional center with four, and a McDonald's was already serving in its food court.

Robinson's did not keep its sign for long.

Its Florida stores went to Maison Blanche in 1987, and in March 1988 the Naples store took the Maison Blanche name.

In August 1991 Dillard's bought it, together with six other stores on Florida's Gulf Coast.

That October the original anchor at the other end of the mall changed its sign as well, and Maas Brothers became Burdines.

By the end of 1991 the four department stores were Sears, Burdines, JCPenney, and Dillard's.

Two of the names were new, and none of the buildings had moved.

A fifth department store cut, a food court built

Those four stores sat at the center of the plan that came next.

In 1992 LaSalle Partners asked the city to add about 517,000 square feet to a mall of about 553,000, with about three-quarters of the new space going to department stores and one more site held for a fifth.

Parking garages would connect to the mall by bridges.

A food court and movie theaters would go on the south side, because JCPenney would not give up its frontage toward Golden Gate Parkway, and the theaters would have their own doors so they could keep running after the mall closed for the night.

Neighbors in Lake Park objected to the traffic and to the size and placement of the new buildings.

The planning board voted 3-1 to recommend denying the rezoning, and city staff asked for the fifth department store to come out and for the southeast garage to stop at two stories.

In November 1992 the City Council approved the expansion anyway, 6-1 on first reading, and gave its final approval later that month.

The fifth department store was out of the main plan, but the ordinance kept it as an option; the mall's leasable space was capped at 995,000 square feet.

What stood finished by 1996 came in under that ceiling.

By then all four anchors had been reshaped.

Sears and Burdines had gone up a floor, JCPenney had stretched east, and Dillard's had shifted into a two-level replacement behind the old store.

Demolishing the former Dillard's cleared the site for the expanded food court and the mall passage to its replacement; another entrance opened opposite the food court, and new garages rose around the mall.

The theaters were left out.

When the work was done, the mall held about 925,000 square feet.

In September 1998 General Growth Properties bought the rebuilt mall for about $114.5 million in cash.

The Cheesecake Factory and a new main entrance

On the U.S. 41 side, the first piece of a new West End was a freestanding Cheesecake Factory, approved in 2004 and finished in 2005.

A compromise with one of the department stores changed its design along the way: the building was spun around 180 degrees, which put its tower at the south end, its loading area at the north, and the valet drop-off on the south side.

Inside the mall, Burdines became Burdines-Macy's in January 2004 and Macy's in March 2005.

The larger rebuild, finished in 2007, cost about $26.6 million.

A walkway with outdoor seating tied the mall to the restaurant, restaurant fronts turned toward the central parking area, and a new main entrance went in with a porte cochere, valet parking, and water features.

Everglades Adventure gave children a soft-play area.

Elsewhere inside, oversized chandeliers hung beneath skylights in The Lobby's tropical-hotel treatment.

The Veranda put ceiling fans over tiled floors and tropical plants, turning the space into a home patio.

By 2007 the mall was 93 percent occupied.

Ted's Montana Grill, Kona Grill, and Ruth's Chris Steak House had joined the Cheesecake Factory in its restaurant lineup.

Newer centers were opening around Naples in those years: Coconut Point in 2006, Gulf Coast Town Center in phases from 2005 to 2007, and Mercato, five miles off, in 2008.

Waterside Shops, with its luxury tenants, already sat three miles north.

Sears came down, and a dine-in cinema went up

Sears announced in August 2018 that its Coastland store would close as part of a national round of closings, and the store shut that November.

The building came down in 2019.

Counting the auto center and related work, about 171,000 square feet was demolished while the rest of the mall stayed open, with asbestos taken out in phases.

The Sears land was a separate property from the mall, about 12 acres held by a joint venture in which General Growth Properties had bought a half interest from Seritage Growth Properties in 2017.

On it the city approved a movie theater of about 35,000 square feet, a new west entrance and facade, new parking, and four areas for later development.

Cinemex Holdings USA, CMX's parent, entered Chapter 11 in April 2020 while the Naples theater was still under construction.

Its shell was largely finished, but the interior sat incomplete for about a year.

Pandemic and hurricane shutdowns added more delay.

CMX CineBistro opened on October 1, 2021, with six auditoriums of roughly 100 recliners each, food brought to the seats, a full kitchen, and a bar, and it hired about 80 people.

Uncle Julio's opened on the old Sears side in September 2022, in a building of about 11,500 square feet at the northwest corner.

The mall stayed leased as its value fell

Asphalt had cracked around the property, plantings had died, shrubs pressed over the sidewalks, and trash collected on the grounds.

Hurricanes and repeated landscaper changes had slowed repairs, while the mall's lender controlled spending during a loan workout.

In January 2024 the city's code enforcement board ordered the company that owned the main mall parcel to restore its approved landscape plan along Ninth Street, Goodlette-Frank Road, and Fleischmann Boulevard.

The deadlines passed, and by October daily fines were accumulating.

That loan dated from 2012, when the part of the mall that secured it was appraised at $233 million.

It had gone to a special servicer as its 2022 maturity approached, and in February 2024 the same property was appraised at $77.4 million.

In March of that year, 96 percent of its space was leased.

The owner changed managers and landscapers, and in November 2024 the grounds met the plan again.

In May 2025, with the mall's pieces held by four separate owners, the mayor asked the city manager to put a discussion of the mall's future on a later agenda.

Three department stores and new restaurants

Coastland Center is open.

Its directory runs to about 100 listings, from H&M, Old Navy, and Hollister to small local shops, two of them marked as newly opened, and CMX shows films on the west end.

Children have a carousel to ride and a play area next to the food court.

JLL manages the property and leases its space, while the mall, its anchors, and its outparcels remain split among separate owners.

The turnover sits in the ring of restaurants.

Aurelio's Pizza closed its dining room in September 2024 after the landlord chose a steakhouse that needed that space and the one beside it, and Rodizio Grill has announced it will open there in 2026.

Bahama Breeze opened on Ninth Street North in June 2024 and closed in May 2025, one of 15 Bahama Breeze restaurants Darden shut that day, and its building stands empty.

Uncle Julio's closed in February 2026, and Atlantic Forge Mediterranean Steakhouse is being fitted out in its building.

Twin Peaks, open since May 2024, and the Cheesecake Factory are serving.

The strain at Coastland showed in the appraised value of its main property, which fell by two-thirds between 2012 and 2024, and in the churn around its edges.

For shoppers, the stores, the cinema, and the food court are open.

In 1992 its owners asked the city to hold a site for a fifth department store.

The city cut it from the main plan but left a fifth store as an option.

Three department stores trade at Coastland now.