The Outlet Collection at Riverwalk, set to open Thursday, builds on downtown New Orleans momentum (2024)

One summer morning in 1986, thousands of people packed Spanish Plaza and released balloons into the Mississippi River breeze in celebration of a new kind of development for New Orleans.The Riverwalk Marketplace, building on the world's fair two years earlier, opened that day as a retail-entertainment destination with hopes of drawings shoppers back from the suburbs and opening the industrial riverfront to more public use.

Almost 30 years later, on Thursday, another ceremony will be held in Spanish Plaza. The Howard Hughes Corp. willreopen the Riverwalk as an outlet mall after an $82 million renovation.

The latest version of the Riverwalk comes at a time when hopes for urban renewal have begun to unfold across the New Orleans city center. More people live in the Central Business and Warehouse districts. National retailers continue to open up shop. The cruise ship industry is going strong, bringing visitors through the port.

In one sense, the Riverwalk tracks closely with North American shopping trends. Over the past eight years, 41 discount-retail outlet malls have opened across the United States and Canada, compared to only one conventional regional shopping mall, according to an industry analyst.

On the other hand, it breaks with fashion. While the image of an outlet mall is usually a sprawling complex in beyond the suburbs, the Riverwalk will be the only U.S. outlet mall in a downtown setting, according to the analyst. No other such urban outlet centers are in development.

Mark Bulmash, Howard Hughes senior vice president for development, said that in recent years the Riverwalk had gone into decline. It lost favor among locals, who at one point had taken great pride in it, Bulmash said. Stores weren't signing long-term leases. Tourists were still visiting but weren't buying much.

The dark interior was decorated with kitschy New Orleans and Mardi Gras themed images. Many of the store spaces had small footprints that couldn't accommodate modern national retailers.

"Our job, and our specialty, is to evaluate the opportunity and future out a way to unleash the value there," Bulmash said. "When we took over, we were trying to reimagine the center. It was on a death spiral."

Howard Hughes inherited the Riverwalk with 33 other properties in 2010 when the company was created as a spinoff of General Growth Properties as it emerged from bankruptcy. Howard Hughes unveiled its plans for converting the property to an outlet mall two years later. The tenants include Neiman Marcus' Last Call Studio -- the first Neiman Marcus store in Louisiana -- along with Coach, Kenneth Cole, LOFT and other dozens of other national brands.

A Riverwalk revamp

On Tuesday, workers inside Riverwalk hustled to put the final touches on the stores, unpacking boxes of clothes and purses. The interior has been brightened with white walls and ceilings.

While most of the signs of the old Riverwalk are gone, a few remain. Cafe du Monde and the Fudgery shops are returning. One Mardi Gras-themed shop will be ready for tourists. A Fat Tuesday daiquiri stand is already churning frozen drinks.

A key element in attracting tenants was expanding the building, which snakes along the river, developers have said. While some of the original stores were only 20 feet deep, national retailers demand depths of 65 to 90 feet.

The renovation added 50,000 square feet, bringing the Riverwalk to a total of 250,000 square feet, while widening it by 30 feet toward the land side and 90 feet toward the river.

Bulmash said that after Hurricane Katrina, more locals wanted to spend their money in the city to boost recovery efforts. Around the same time, the great recession hit. As the economy slowly recovered, retailers focused any expansion on Internet sales and outlets, rather than conventional stores.

From that economic picture, the Howard Hughes company looked to bring an outlet mall to New Orleans. Apublicly traded company, Howard Hughes develops and manages properties such as master-planned communities like The Woodlands outside of Houston and Summerlin outside of Las Vegas.

Bulmash said the company approached Riverwalk as not only retail but part of a larger mixed-use picture. The immediate area includes the Hilton Riverside hotel and the 14-story One River Place condominium building.

Linda Humphers, editor-in-chief and director of Value Retail News, said outlets are the main retail sector with openings today, attracting a developer such as Hughes, which has never previously done an outlet center. Meanwhile, retailers aren't seeing strong growth in conventional malls but are looking to reach value-driven customers, she said.

For a department store like Neiman Marcus, which didn't previously operate in Louisiana, the Riverwalk offers a chance to expand through its outlet Last Call Studio."It reaches a customer they wouldn't normally reach with their full-priced store," Humphers said.

The Riverwalk's roots

The Riverwalk was developed as a "festival marketplace," a shopping and entertainment concept being unrolled in cities across the country -- Baltimore, Philadelphia and others -- by the Rouse Co., founded by urban renewal pioneer Jim Rouse.When planning for the 1984 world's fair got underway, Rouse partnered on development of the international pavilion along the riverfront with the understanding that Rouse would take over the space once the fair ended, said Jim Brandt, the fair's director of planning.

The hopes were to open up the riverfront and rejuvenate the Warehouse District."Essentially, it was a fairly major break-through as far as having any public access or utilization of the valuable riverfront, unused riverfront for the most part until this came along," Brandt said.

The Riverwalk was later built using parts of the international pavilion, which housed foreign nations' exhibits during the fair. A 1984 story in The Times-Picayune about Rouse's $55 milion plan was headlined: "Rouse's Riverwalk offers life after the fair".

Now, the Riverwalk is rejoining a rapidly changing commerce district, as mostly vacant office towers are converted into apartments and demand for Warehouse District condos has peaked. Stores and restaurants have followed the new residents. Urban planners are sparking conversations about creating urban green spaces and open recreation spaces.With locals and tourists as potential customers, national retailers , Tiffany & Co. and other luxury brands have opened.

Perez architects was the firm originally on the Riverwalk project in the 1980s. The firm's president, Angela O'Byrne, said it's wonderful to see the Riverwalk -- which preceded her time at the company -- being refurbished by a national company with a strong track record.

This week, O'Byrne attended the International Council of Shopping Centers' annual conference in Las Vegas, a mega-event that brings together commercial developers and retailers. The New Orleans Business Alliance also ventures to the conference every year as part of its retail recruitment mission.

"Where New Orleans was in the role of seeking out retailers, now the retailers are seeking out New Orleans," she said. "It's a nice change to see that. People are getting more and more interested in New Orleans. All of that is making the newly refurbished Riverwalk that much more attractive."