Rockland Centre
Rockland Centre is a upscale mall located in Mount Royal, Quebec, Canada adjacent to the city limits of Montreal. It is owned by Cominar.[1]
Current structure
Rockland Centre has three floors; the main and top floors are shopping space.
The basement floor has four tenants: Sports Experts, Nautilus Plus fitness club, Eggspectation restaurant and Urban Planet shop.
The first (main) floor features boutiques and the anchors Linen Chest (part of the old Eaton's space), Pharmaprix and longtime tenant The Bay.
The second (top) floor consists of boutiques and the mall's food court. The Bay's second floor is located on the mall's top floor.
Historical
Original shopping centre (1959-1981)
Rockland Centre first opened in 1959 with tenants Steinberg's, Morgan's and Woolworth's. Rockland Centre's shape, at the time, was somewhat similar to how the malls looks today. However, it was a outdoor shopping centre with a single floor. The exception is Morgan's that had three floors (when counting its basement). Rockland Centre was built on what used to be a golf course.
Morgan's was rebranded as The Bay in 1972.
Renovations to upscale indoor mall (1981-1982)
In 1981, Rockland Centre underwent to its biggest change of its history to redefine itself as the upscale mall it is today.
The majority of the shopping centre was demolished and rebuilt as a two story enclosed mall. Only Steinberg's, The Bay and a handful of boutiques were spared from the demolition.
A new Eaton's store was added where the demolished Woolworth's stood.
The Bay seized the occasion to move to a new roomier space built next to its original location, but with two floors instead of three. The Bay's original location was converted into mall space (and it's former basement is since 2007 the home of Sports Experts/Atmosphere).
A huge number of new stores were added during the conversion of Rockland Centre, notably Holt Renfrew.
A multi-level parking lot was also built between The Bay and Eaton's during the transformation of Rockland Centre.
Demise of Steinberg's and afterwards (1992-present)
Steinberg's, one of the last original tenants of Rockland Centre by 1992, became a Metro that year.
Metro closed the store in 1999. Today the space has been dismantled by Pharmaprix, SAQ and a relocated Bank of Montreal.
Demise of Eaton's and afterwards (1999-present)
Eaton's closed shop in 1999.
An existing Linen-Chest store relocated to the first floor of Eaton's. The rest of the first floor of Eaton's, that was not retained by Linen-Chest, went to new boutiques.
The second floor of Eaton's was taken over by Sports Experts.
In 2007, the Sports Experts store was moved from its location on the second floor to the vacant food court area on the basement (previously The Bay's/Morgan's until 1981). In a swap of locations, the food court was moved to the second floor where Sports Experts previously was (formerly Eaton's second floor).
Modern tenants
The mall is home to two H&M stores, VERO MODA, JACK & JONES, StyleXChange, Diesel, Rudsak, Harry Rosen, Buffalo, Le Château, Michael Kors, Stuart Weitzman Benetton, Zara, Mexx and Guess.
Popular culture
In the early 1990s, the mall was the filming location for the episode "Tale of the Pinball Wizard" from the children's horror/fantasy television show Are You Afraid of the Dark?.
Anchors
- The Bay (153,648 sq ft or 14,274.4 m2)
- Boutique Linen Chest (30,225 sq ft or 2,808.0 m2)
- H & M (22,290 sq ft or 2,070.8 m2)
- Sports Experts (21,305 sq ft or 1,979.3 m2)
- Zara (15,273 sq ft or 1,418.9 m2)
- StyleXChange (15,510 sq ft or 1,440.9 m2)
- S.A.Q. (17,365 sq ft or 1,613.3 m2)
- Pharmaprix (16,716 sq ft or 1,553.0 m2)
- Nautilus Plus (14,997 sq ft or 1,393.3 m2)