The Mall at Wellington Green Opened Two New Doors on the Same Day, and Neither One Sells Clothes

If you shop at the Mall at Wellington Green, you have probably driven or walked past the old Francesca's storefront on the second level a hundred times without a second thought. This summer it stopped being empty, and what moved in tells you more about where this mall is headed than any press release could.

On June 27, two storefronts opened on the same day. Neither sells clothes in the traditional sense, and neither is what you'd expect from a mall that has spent 25 years anchored by Macy's, Dillard's and JCPenney.

Bikini Bar took over the old Francesca's spot on the second level, directly across from CMX Cinemas. It's a swimwear boutique built around a beach-club lounge feel, just under 1,500 square feet, selling resort wear and handcrafted jewelry alongside the swimsuits. On the same Saturday, on the first level next to the Food Court, Arcade Time relocated out of its old second-floor footprint into a new 13,000-square-foot space, nearly triple its previous size, with billiards, retro games, a full-service kitchen and a bar. The company had just been named the top arcade in the country at the 41st Bowling Center Architecture and Design Awards, and owner Jonathan Demare used the expansion to bet that people want somewhere to eat and drink while they play, not just a room full of machines.

Two openings, one date, neither one selling what a mall traditionally sells. That's not a coincidence. It's a strategy, and the mall's own marketing manager said so out loud.

The Mall Told You What It's Doing

Julie Schalm, marketing manager for the Mall at Wellington Green, gave a local TV crew the plainest description of the shift you'll find anywhere:

"We are transforming this mall from 'come here and shop' to 'come here and watch a movie or watch a comedy show or play arcade games.'"

That's not marketing language dressed up for a press release. It's a direct statement of intent, and Bikini Bar and Arcade Time are the two most visible pieces of proof so far.

There's a number behind the strategy worth knowing, too. The International Council of Shopping Centers reports that physical retail still captures 86 percent of all retail spending nationally, with e-commerce accounting for the remaining 14 percent. Read that the way mall management appears to be reading it: the story that online shopping killed the mall is mostly wrong, but the stores that survive are the ones offering something you can't get from a browser tab. You can order a swimsuit online. You can't order an evening of pool, skee-ball and a bar tab with your kids' friend group. That's the bet on both new storefronts.

The Anchor That's Still Dark

None of that explains the biggest empty space in the building, and if you've shopped at Wellington Green in the last several years, you've walked past it. The old Nordstrom, which opened in 2003 and closed in April 2019, still sits dark at just over 120,000 square feet. For a while it held Spirit Halloween pop-ups and overflow storage. Arcade Time briefly used part of it too, before its full-scale relocation this summer.

The current plan for that space has nothing to do with arcades or beach lounges. Bainbridge Companies filed an application with the Village of Wellington in late March 2026 to demolish the old Nordstrom and build a 620-unit apartment complex across three seven-story towers, with a clubhouse, pool and parking structure, on roughly 18 acres of the mall's footprint. Village Manager Jim Barnes has been candid about why the village is entertaining it at all:

"Not only in the county, but throughout the state, and even out of the state, there is a shortage of housing units."

Barnes also made a point that's easy to miss in a housing story: the mall's remaining department stores aren't the problem. "Macy's, Dillard's and JCPenney are high-performing stores," he said. "I heard that the Macy's at the Mall at Wellington Green is the highest-performing store in the state." As of this summer, the apartment proposal hasn't been approved and no construction timeline exists. It's still working through Village review, echoing an earlier proposal for the same site, one that would have added a Crystal Lagoon, apartments and outdoor entertainment, that never made it past pandemic-era complications and resident opposition back in 2019 and 2020.

Two Bets, One Building

Here's what's actually happening at your local mall right now, and it's worth understanding as two separate experiments rather than one trend. The Bikini Bar and Arcade Time strategy is a bet that you fill small and mid-size vacancies by offering experiences that can't be replicated at home, and pair them with dining and drinks people will drive for. It's already showing signs of working: mall leadership points to summer becoming one of the property's busiest seasons, driven by exactly this kind of tenant.

The Nordstrom situation is a different bet entirely, and it's not really about retail at all. Rather than try to backfill 120,000 square feet with another department store or another entertainment concept, the proposal on the table gives up on retailing that space altogether and turns it into housing. It's a wager that the mall's long-term health depends less on drawing new shoppers through the door and more on having hundreds of new residents living on top of it, spending in the food court and the remaining stores as a captive built-in customer base.

Both bets are live at the same time, inside the same building, and neither one has fully proven out yet. That's the part worth knowing if you live nearby and have wondered why the mall feels different this year than it did two or three years ago. It's not one clear direction. It's two theories running in parallel, tested in real time on the same 1.3 million square foot property.

What's Actually New If You're Going This Fall

If you're planning a trip to Wellington Green this fall, here's what changed since early summer:

• Bikini Bar — second level, former Francesca's space, directly across from CMX Cinemas, opened June 27
• Arcade Time — first level, adjacent to the Food Court, 13,000 square feet with a full kitchen and bar, opened the same day after relocating and nearly tripling in size

Mall hours remain Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The old Nordstrom entrance, for now, stays exactly what it's been for years: closed, with a future that depends on a Village approval process that hasn't concluded.

For anyone living in Wycliffe, the mall has always been the closer, larger option compared to driving into West Palm Beach, and that hasn't changed. What has changed is what's worth the trip. We've covered what opened in the corridor right outside the gate this summer, and Wellington Green is the next piece of that picture: a mall in the middle of figuring out, in public and in real time, what it wants to be next.

None of this changes what makes Wycliffe itself work day to day, the golf, the clubhouse, the gate. But knowing why your mall looks and feels different this year, rather than just noticing that it does, is the kind of local detail that's easy to miss and useful to have.

If you're weighing how changes like this ripple into property values or buyer interest around Wycliffe, that's a conversation worth having with someone who tracks this market closely. Call Ruby Teich at 561-418-0708 or email [email protected] to talk through what's actually moving in this corner of Wellington.