In 1976, the intersection of 71st Street and Memorial Drive was on the southeastern edge of Tulsa's developed area. Most of the land around it was still farmland. There was no shopping corridor and no major commercial district.
On July 15, Sears opened on an 81-acre property developed by Homart Development and Dayton Hudson Corporation. The formal dedication took place on August 4, giving Oklahoma its largest indoor mall.
The site was about 10 miles from downtown. It had two levels, anchored at opening by Sears and John A. Brown; Dillard's opened later that year.
The early tenants included Casual Corner, Athlete's Foot, Musicland, B. Dalton Bookseller, and Piccadilly Cafeteria. Together, they showed what American retail looked like in the mid-1970s.
Woodland Hills Mall Opens and Reshapes South Tulsa
Charles Kober & Associates served as the mall's architects. Coleman-Ervin & Associates and RYA Architects also worked on the project.
They created a two-level enclosed mall with department store anchors. That basic layout stayed in place for decades.
Before the mall opened, there was very little retail development east of the site. After it opened, the 71st Street corridor grew into one of the strongest retail areas in Oklahoma.
Woodland Hills Mall drove much of the commercial growth that came afterward.
By 2011, the mall had more than 165 stores. About half were not available anywhere else in Tulsa. Annual sales were more than $450 per square foot.
The project also changed the area in another way. The mall's developers donated a 3-acre parcel to the Tulsa City-County Library.
The South Regional Library opened there in 1982 and was later renamed Hardesty South Regional Library.
People used it heavily from the day it opened. Woodland Hills did more than bring shoppers to south Tulsa. It also helped create a new local service area where one had not existed before.
The Expansion That Turned It Into a Four-Anchor Mall
The mall's expansion to the east began in February 1980. By March 3, 1982, the property had grown from 81 acres to 152 acres. Leasable space had increased to about 1,016,000 square feet.
The project added 60 new specialty shops, a food court, and a new anchor store, Sanger-Harris, which opened at Woodland Hills on August 11, 1982.
That gave the mall four department stores - Sears, Dillard's, John A. Brown, and Sanger-Harris - a four-anchor setup that defined the property for years, even as some store names later changed.
The area around the mall also became easier to reach. Over time, as nearby roads improved, U.S. 169 and later the Creek Turnpike gave shoppers better access from across the region.
Housing, smaller retail, and services steadily filled in the surrounding land. The mall that had opened in the middle of farmland now stood at the center of a growing commercial district.
By the mid-1980s, department-store chains had started the mergers and consolidations that changed malls across the country.
Sanger-Harris later became part of Foley's. At Woodland Hills Mall, the effect was not dramatic at first.
The mall stayed busy, its anchor lineup remained strong, and it continued drawing shoppers from the growing residential areas on Tulsa's south side.
The 1995 Renovation That Changed the Interior
By 1995, RREEF Funds owned Woodland Hills Mall and put $8 million into renovating a building that was nearly 20 years old.
The design firm for the project was The Alliance of Minneapolis. Hoar Construction of Birmingham served as the general contractor.
Construction crews cut openings in the roof and installed a skylight system with two rotunda areas at Center Court.
They rebuilt the upper-level ceiling with stepped coves and replaced the lower-level ceiling. The floors were redone with natural stone tile in several colors.
The project also added a 26-foot-diameter water fountain, a new escalator, and glass guardrails finished with mahogany and brass.
All four mall entrances were rebuilt with oversized classical porticos.
The finished interior used polished granite and marble tile, mahogany benches, and glass handrails with brass details.
The building had opened as a typical suburban mall from the 1970s. After the 1995 renovation, it had the look of a higher-end regional shopping center.
Ownership Changes and Anchors Swap Their Names
Simon Property Group entered the picture in early 2002. In February of that year, Woodland Hills Mall was part of a multi-center transaction.
On May 3, 2002, Simon, together with Westfield and Rouse, bought the partnership interests of Rodamco North America, taking a 47.2 percent ownership stake.
The property measured 1,091,500 square feet at 95.4 percent occupancy.
On December 15, 2004, Simon increased its ownership to roughly 94.5 percent, paying approximately $119.5 million, including debt assumption.
The Foley's anchor changed names in 2006. Federated Department Stores converted it to Macy's in September as part of a nationwide rebrand of its regional chains.
Sanger-Harris had been absorbed into Foley's years earlier, meaning the same physical footprint had carried three anchor identities by the time Macy's moved in.
The lineup settled into Macy's, Dillard's, JCPenney, and Sears - the four names most Tulsans associated with the mall for the following decade.
Sears Closes and Leaves a Large Empty Space
Sears had been part of Woodland Hills Mall from the very beginning.
In October 2018, the last Sears store in Tulsa - the one at Woodland Hills - was scheduled to close by the end of the year as part of Sears' Chapter 11 bankruptcy and a nationwide round of 142 store closures.
The closing left a 75,100-square-foot empty anchor space on the west end of the mall. Seritage Growth Properties held an interest in that space through earlier agreements involving former Sears locations.
At Woodland Hills Mall, the empty Sears space sat at one of the most visible ends of the property, facing the parking lots and the road.
That made it a major redevelopment site. Within four years of the store's closure, a new plan was in place - something on a scale the mall had not seen since its 1982 expansion.
A Ferris Wheel Replaces the Old Sears Anchor
In November 2022, the Tulsa City Council approved the Woodland Hills Economic Development Project Plan. That plan created a sales-tax-only increment district for the west side of the property.
Under the deal, SCHEELS could receive up to $10 million in sales-tax reimbursements through a TIF district, tied to an estimated $132 million investment over a term of up to 15 years.
The City of Tulsa's 2022 annual report highlighted the project and expected it to bring hundreds of jobs to the site.
The project needed rezoning so the building could have a larger footprint. A public water line also had to be moved on land that had originally been platted in 1975.
The stated size of the project changed at different stages: 240,000 square feet in the 2022 announcement, 250,000 square feet in city materials, and 319,000 square feet on SCHEELS' official page after the store opened.
Tulsa SCHEELS opened on October 19, 2024, as the company's first location in Oklahoma.
The store includes more than 75 specialty shops, a 65-foot Ferris wheel, a 16,000-gallon saltwater aquarium, a wildlife mountain display, arcade games, Ginna's Cafe, and Fuzziwig's Candy Factory.
For more than forty years, the west end of Woodland Hills Mall had held a single department store. That part of the mall had now become its own destination.
What Comes Next for Tulsa's Flagship Mall
Simon's 2026 property table lists Woodland Hills Mall at 1,238,600 square feet and 98.4 percent occupancy.
The current selected-tenant list includes Macy's, Dillard's, JCPenney, SCHEELS, Holiday Inn Express, and Courtyard by Marriott.
Simon listed Kura Revolving Sushi Bar as coming soon to the mall, with a March-May 2026 promotional page, and Shoe Palace as coming soon to the lower level near center court, with no opening dates given for either.
Neither is a landmark addition, but both fit the pattern of specialty retail and food filling in around the anchors to keep the property at near-full occupancy.
Full-service restaurants, including Texas de Brazil and The Cheesecake Factory, two hotels on the outparcels, and a 319,000-square-foot destination anchor built on the former Sears site, all sit alongside the traditional enclosed-mall retail.
The mall that opened on empty farmland southeast of downtown Tulsa nearly fifty years ago shows no sign of slowing down.
Notable Milestones
1976 - Sears opens on July 15 at the future mall site. Woodland Hills Mall is dedicated on August 4 and opens as Oklahoma's largest indoor mall.
1982 - Eastward expansion opens on March 3. The property grows from 81 to 152 acres, adds 60 specialty shops and a food court, and reaches about 1,016,000 square feet. Sanger-Harris opens on August 11.
1980s to 1990s - Sanger-Harris is absorbed into Foley's as department-store chains consolidate.
1995 - RREEF Funds completes an $8 million renovation. The project adds skylights, rebuilt ceilings, new stone flooring, a 26-foot fountain, a new escalator, glass guardrails, and rebuilt entrances.
2002 - Simon Property Group acquires an ownership interest in Woodland Hills Mall as part of a larger mall transaction.
2004 - Simon increases its ownership stake to about 94.5 percent.
2006 - Foley's at Woodland Hills becomes Macy's during Federated's nationwide rebranding.
2018 - Sears at 6929 S Memorial Drive closes as part of the chain's Chapter 11 bankruptcy and nationwide store shutdowns.
2022 - Tulsa approves the Woodland Hills Economic Development Project Plan for the redevelopment of the former Sears site and the west side of the property.
2024 - Tulsa SCHEELS opens on October 19 as the company's first Oklahoma store, replacing the former Sears anchor with a larger destination-format retail space.
2025 to 2026 - Woodland Hills Mall continues operating as a major regional mall with more than 140 stores.
Woodland Hills Mall
Shopping mall in Tulsa, OK
Address: 7021 S Memorial Dr, Tulsa, OK 74133
Opened: August 4, 1976
Developer: Dayton-Hudson Corporation and Homart Development Company
Owner: Simon Property Group
Floor area: 1,238,600 square feetClosest cities:
Broken Arrow, OK
Jenks, OK
Bixby, OK
Muskogee, OK
Sapulpa, OK
