![]() The mall's architecture and design was themed after "the agrarian heartland", a look inspired by its rural setting and taking after a wide variety of sources, from the Googie-style diners of the 1950s to Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie School architecture. on August 8, 1991, allowing 70,000 visitors to see the place before stores opened at 10 a.m. The Gurnee Mills concourse opened to the public at 8 a.m. Mills Corporation (1991–2007) A satellite view of Gurnee Mills (top left) shows the nearby Six Flags Great America (bottom right). A total of 1.6 million hours of work went into the construction process, which took 25 months. At the ceremony, four anchor retailers were announced: Sears Outlet, Reading China and Glass, Phar-Mor, and the Gurnee Mills Family Entertainment Center, a children's amusement area modeled after the 49th Street Galleria in Salt Lake City. By this time, plans had been expanded and the construction site consisted of 422 acres of farm fields and wetlands. Ĭonstruction on the mall, which was projected to cost $160 million, began with a groundbreaking ceremony on July 19, 1989. Local residents were concerned that the mall would steal customers from small local businesses and existing malls like Waukegan's nearby Lakehurst Mall and the Pleasant Prairie Premium Outlets, while Western Development was worried that Gurnee was too small to handle the construction project, despite the success of Six Flags Great America down the road. Western Development later renamed itself the Mills Corporation after its malls. "Gurnee Mills" would become the fourth mall in Western Development's "Landmark Mills" chain, after Potomac Mills, which opened in 1985, and Philadelphia Mills and Sawgrass Mills, which were under construction at the time. The plan was to annex 324 acres of unincorporated land near the intersection of the Tri-State Tollway and Grand Avenue, on which the mall would be built, into the village of Gurnee. The Western Development Corporation first announced its plans to build a super-regional shopping center in Lake County, Illinois in 1988. When the latest generation of the family sold the land to be developed, they had some conditions, primarily that the oldest trees on the property be preserved and the wetlands along the highway be kept intact. The corner of Grand Avenue and Hunt Club Road was long known as Lamb's Corners, where various members of the family farmed and operated a long succession of small businesses. The land where Gurnee Mills stands today was plotted out as part of Section 16 of Warren Township, and most of it was owned by the prominent Lamb family from 1837 until sold to the mall's developers in 1988. The mall draws more than 20 million visitors each year. Once marketed as the "world's largest outlet mall", Gurnee Mills features a variety of manufacturer's outlets in addition to the more typical mall retailers, and like other nearby outlet malls it is a popular attraction for tourists visiting the Chicago area, with thousands of tour buses making stops at the mall each year. ![]() The mall features Hobby Lobby, Macy's, Kohl's, Marshalls, Value City Furniture, Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World, Off Broadway Shoe Warehouse, Forever 21, H&M, Dick's Sporting Goods, Marcus Theatres, Rainforest Cafe, Top Shelf Ice Arena, The RoomPlace, Lee Wrangler Clearance Center, Burlington Coat Factory, and Floor & Decor as its anchor tenants. ![]() Owned and operated by the Simon Property Group, it was an early part of the "Landmark Mills" chain of shopping malls built by the Mills Corporation. With 1,936,699 square feet (179,925 m 2) of gross leasable area and ten major anchor stores in its Z-shaped single-story building, it is the third largest mall in Illinois, and the largest of the four enclosed shopping centers in Lake County. Like the nearby Six Flags Great America and Great Wolf Lodge, the mall's placement in Gurnee is intended to bring customers from Chicago, Illinois. Gurnee Mills is a shopping mall and outlet mall in Gurnee, Illinois, within the Chicago metropolitan area and it is one of the tourist destinations in Chicago, Illinois. ![]()
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