Westfield Southcenter Mall in Tukwila, WA, Keeps Breaking Records

Birth of a Giant: The Making of Southcenter Mall

On a patch of marshland in Tukwila, Washington, between two unfinished interstates and a river tamed by a new dam, three men imagined a new kind of city. It was 1956, and James Douglas, Wells McCurdy, and Rex Allison were thinking in acres, not square feet.

The trio, veterans of Seattle’s Northgate Center, had founded Southcenter Corporation as a subsidiary of Allied Stores with a simple aim: to replicate Northgate’s success, but grander.

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