Shoppers Square is going through quite a change. About 30 percent of the mall is getting torn down. About half of that will get rebuilt and the interior will be remodeled to create the Reno Public Market. It will have a new organic grocery store and a food hall with about 25 local restaurants.
"We're anchoring the food hall with Fifty Fifty Brewing which, on its roof, is going to create an event space for 200 people," Doug Wiele, President of Foothill Partners said.
The mall has been a mainstay on the corner of Plumb Lane and South Virginia Street for decades but the developers say it has lost its relevance. They say the new model will offer a place for the community to gather. It will have a stage for music and other entertainment. About 20 percent will be set aside for art and culture.
"We think you'll be down, drinking some beer and having Korean tacos and ask yourself, 'Wait a minute. How did I find myself in a gallery? Oh, and there's the artist making the art,'" Wiele said.
"I have never seen to this magnitude, integrated arts and culture and entertainment and food and shopping and really bring it back to a community gathering place," Mayor Hillary Schieve for the City of Reno said.
The original building is about 150,000 square feet. Demolition of the 8,000 square-foot space on the west side of the building will create a drive-through for CVS and another entrance from Wells Avenue.
"We're opening our door to Wells Avenue with the demolition of this building, so it's really going to create a nice front over here on this side of the project," Rick Casazza, Partner, Reno Public Market said.
"If you live behind the shopping center, you feel like you've had your back turned on you. Well, we're getting rid of that," Wiele said.
The project is happening on one of the busiest intersections in Reno. It is right across the street from the Park Lane Project, which will create a large mixed-use community.
"We think we feed each other," Wiele said. "We think we make that a better place to live and we think we become a better place to sell food because of all of those residents."
"Our food hall, we want it to be the living room to the 1,800 apartments that are across the street," Casazza said. "We also want to be the living room to the Midtown area, to the Wells Avenue neighborhood."
Casazza says this area of town is going through a renaissance, connecting the Midtown, Old Southwest and Wells Avenue neighborhoods together.
"Midtown is very eclectic and it's got a great vibrance of it's own and we want to be a part of that," Casazza said.
"The synergy in this part of town is going to be nothing that Reno residents have seen in a very, very long time," Schieve said.
The $34 million project is expected to be completed in 2021. Existing businesses IHOP, Bank of America, CVS, Port of Subs and Cold Stone Creamery are staying put.
