Godspeed Pembroke Mall

For people who didn't hear (or basically don't care), and the Hampton Roads diaspora who haven't thought about Pembroke Mall for a long time.. It is being transformed in to assisted living & hotel space. The reporting is that the anchor stores that surround the mall will remain (Target, Kohl's etc), while the smaller stores that made up the guts of Pembroke will be gone & replaced with housing. 

It's a strange transformation.. but regrettably makes sense in an era where large retail space is becoming obsolete..

The abandoned Sears in it's last days..

Bit of England in it's last hours..

All the good memories of Space Port, Mother's Records, Pizza Delight, Orange Julius, Fine's, the old Waldenbooks (vital before Barnes & Noble & Borders). Laughing at(or with) Pembroke's experiment in mall carpeting. This place meant a lot.

contact- nat.rain@gmail.com

 

With the imminent transformation of Pembroke Mall, effectively from retail to residential space (a senior living facility and a hotel.) Thought I'd post some old mall floor plans & images.

I noticed the creator of this map accidentally misspelled Jeanne street.

This one was undated, or at least I didn't see a date, but from first-hand memories, I think it's circa 1992. 

One of my first memories of Pembroke was when the Orange Julius was in front of Sears' interior entrance (before moving to the center of the mall). It had the old template, with the glass counter, filled with plastic oranges.

(not Pembroke, but you can see the orange-filled counter, and the acid-washed jeans)

An earlier post on the old exterior Pembroke theaters- https://lostvirginiabeach.blogspot.com/2019/12/ultra-vision-theatre-that-once.html

Contact- nat.rain@gmail.com

 

Ultra Vision Theatre that once inhabited a back corner of Pembroke Mall's parking lot..

Bottom of the photo depicts a similar theater built in Florida. I notice the ad generically refers to Pembroke's location as 'Norfolk, Virginia' (instead of it's accurate location in VB). Guess Norfolk had more national recognition at the time..

Crowd outside, 1982.

They also had a summer tradition of showing kinda second-run kids' movies..

An exterior shot I found in a local 1984 yearbook.

I believe the theater (their spelling was theatre, but..) was bulldozed in the late '80s, and replaced by theaters inside Pembroke. The last reference I found to it's existence, was controversy surrounding their potential showing of the Last Temptation of Christ (Sept 7, 1988 Daily Press).

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