La Encantada and Tucson’s Luxury Gap
Before La Encantada, Tucson had shopping in the way it has weather: reliably, predictably, and with a certain sameness you learn to work around. What it did not have was an upscale address for retail desire.
People with money and the habit of spending it on luxury brands developed a second habit: driving to Phoenix or Scottsdale, or flying somewhere with better options and worse parking.
That absence mattered more than people wanted to say…