City Creek Center opens in Salt Lake City on March 22, 2012, the only mall of its size to open in 2012.
“City Creek Center is literally the only regional shopping center in the entire country to open, and we couldn’t be happier for it to be opening right here in Salt Lake City,” said Ron Loch, vice president of Planning and Design for Taubman, a company primarily engaged in developing large retail malls.
Linda Wardell, general manager of City Creek Center, said the mall expects to create 2,000 permanent jobs.
The center will house restaurants, retail stores, offices and residential apartments. It features designer stores new to Utah — such as Tiffany & Co., Michael Kors and Coach — and a Nordstrom with an enormous LED light display. The old Historic ZCMI storefront will be on Macy’s.
City Creek also will have a fountain called “Transcend” that shoots fire and water.
“The fountain designer is the same designer who designed the Bellagio fountains, so they love to name their pieces of art,” Loch said.
Loch said the center was designed to emulate City Creek itself . Waterfalls turning into a creek emulates the original south fork of City Creek and runs throughout the shopping center. Natural stone plays a prominent part in the design, and views of City Creek’s natural tree canopy are etched into the glass of the sky bridge across Main Street.
The mall features a roof which will retract in warm weather and be closed in cold or rain. Each roof has its own weather station, so the roof can close on its own when a storm is approaching. The end walls — two large glass panels — close like garage doors to keep either heat or air conditioning in.
“We’ve designed an experience that will be comfortable for 12 months out of the year,” Loch said. “You can’t actually buy these out of a catalog, everything is custom-made and custom-designed.”
When complete, City Creek Center will house 700,000 square feet of shopping and dining space, including Texas de Brazil Churrascaria and The Cheesecake Factory. Also available will be the large customer service desk, which features a flight board showing statuses of flights at the Salt Lake City Airport, the weather at flight destinations, and the weather at Utah ski resorts.
“We’ve tried to think of everything but we’re always open to more suggestions,” Wardell said.
There are two integrated components of the development: the shopping center, owned, operated, managed and leased by the Taubman Company; and the residential and office development,which is owned by City Creek Reserve Inc., a development company owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“I think some parts of it have actually been in the works for about 10 years,” Wardell said.
Wardell said grand opening activities will be announced within a few weeks.
