Toronto’s Yorkdale Shopping Centre has announced a new west expansion, which will be anchored by a flagship Restoration Hardware. The expansion will involve demising the mall’s former 190,000 square foot Sears location. It will add to the mall’s already substantial expansion plans, which includes an eastward expansion to be anchored by Nordstrom and Uniqlo. We have included lease plans in this article, provided by Yorkdale’s landlord, Oxford Properties.
The new west expansion will span an estimated 120,000 square feet. Of that, 69,000 square feet is earmarked for upscale home furnishings retailer Restoration Hardware. The four-level store will be Restorations Hardware’s largest Canadian location. The new west expansion is scheduled to open in November of 2016.
The mall’s 298,000 square foot east expansion, currently under construction, will house a 191,000 square foot Nordstrom, a 24,000 square foot Uniqlo, and about 30 additional retailers. Sources say that a number of retailers in the east expansion will be new to Canada, as Yorkdale is now considered to be Canada’s top destination for retail brands looking to enter the Canadian market. The east expansion is scheduled to open in August of 2016.
Yorkdale also completed a $220 million southwest expansion in 2012. The expansion included a significantly enlarged Holt Renfrew, which grew from about 65,000 square feet to over 120,000 square feet. The expansion also houses Canada’s largest Apple Store as well as retailers such as Tesla Motors, Microsoft Store, Club Monaco, John Varvatos, Anthropologie and AllSaints.
By 2018, Yorkdale is expected to be North America’s top-selling shopping centre, with sales anticipated to exceed $2 billion. The mall already includes Canada’s densest concentration of luxury brands, located in the mall’s ‘luxury wing’ in the area adjacent to Holt Renfrew. Yorkdale is currently the only suburban Canadian shopping centre to feature a world-class luxury retail component, housing free-standing locations for brands such as Cartier, Bulgari, Mulberry, Jimmy Choo, Moncler, David Yurman, Montblanc, Versace, Salvatore Ferragamo, Hugo Boss, and others. This spring, French luxury brand Longchamp will open a new store across from Holt’s and in July, luxury timepiece brand Jaeger-LeCoultre will open its first Canadian location. Holt Renfrew, itself, features mall-facing concessions for luxury brands Chanel, Prada, Gucci and Louis Vuitton, as well as internal concessions for Dior, Giorgio Armani and others.
Sources say that a further westward expansion could be in the works for Yorkdale, and we’ll discuss this further when permitted.
*We previously featured a rendering in this article, and were requested to remove the image.Â
Yorkdale keeps outdoing itself.