La Plaza, originally Palm Springs Plaza and also known as La Plaza de California, is an on-street, open-air shopping center at the heart of downtown

Palm Springs, California Palm Springs (Cahuilla language, Cahuilla: ''Séc-he'') is a desert resort city in Riverside County, California, United States, within the Colorado Desert's Coachella Valley. The city covers approximately , making it the largest city in Rivers ...

. It is located between the main southbound artery through downtown, South Palm Canyon Drive, and the northbound artery, Indian Canyon Drive, along a divided road called La Plaza, with storefronts on all of those streets as well as on the north backside (Tahquitz Canyon) and south backside (Arenas). The historic Plaza Theatre is an anchor.

History

Palm Springs Plaza, as it was then called, opened November 1, 1936, one of the first shopping centers in Southern California with a single developer, owner and a uniform appearance, after

Westwood Village Westwood is a commercial and residential neighborhood in the northern central portion of the Westside region of the city of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Bordering the campus on th ...

(1929). It contained a parking garage on three levels with parking for 141 cars, the largest garage in

Riverside County Riverside County is a county located in the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, its population was 2,418,185, making it the fourth-most populous county in California and the 10th-most populous in the Unit ...

Desmond's (department store) Desmond's was a Los Angeles–based department store, during its existence second only to Harris & Frank as the oldest Los Angeles retail chain, founded in the 1860s as a hat shop by Daniel Desmond at Los Angeles and Commercial streets. The ...

was an original anchor and continued to operate until 2005.

Downtown Palm Springs shopping district

Resort stores

Bullock's Bullock's was a chain of full-line department stores from 1907 through 1995, headquartered in Los Angeles, growing to operate across California, Arizona and Nevada. Bullock's also operated as many as seven more upscale Bullocks Wilshire specialt ...

, a large upscale department store on Broadway in Los Angeles, opened a

Spanish Colonial The Spanish Colonial Revival architecture (), often known simply as Spanish Revival, is a term used to encompass a number of revivalist architectural styles based in both Spanish colonial architecture and Spanish architecture in general. These ...

-style "resort store" in the Desert Inn complex in 1930. I. Magnin followed, opening a resort store in the

El Mirador Hotel Torney General Hospital was a US Army Hospital in Palm Springs, California, in Riverside County used during World War II. Parts of Torney General Hospital are now the Desert Regional Medical Center. In November 1945 Torney General Hospital was ...

on December 1, 1933, closing when that resort was turned into a military hospital in 1942. When Bullock's opened a full department store at 151 Palm Canyon Drive in 1947, J. W. Robinson's, another large L.A. store, took the former Bullock's location and opened its own resort store there.

Full department stores

After La Plaza was built, additional junior and full-line department stores started to be established on Palm Canyon Drive immediately adjacent to La Plaza.

Bullocks Wilshire Bullocks Wilshire, located at 3050 Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, California, is a Art Deco building. The building opened in September 1929 as a luxury department store for owner John G. Bullock (owner of the more mainstream Bullock's in Dow ...

(#151, 1947-1990), J. W. Robinson's (#333, 1958-1987),"Robinson's celebrating 75th anniversary", Desert Sun(Palm Springs, CA), January 9, 1958
/ref> and

Saks Fifth Avenue Saks Fifth Avenue (Colloquialism, colloquially Saks) is an American Luxury goods, luxury department store chain founded in 1867 by Andrew Saks. The first store opened in the F Street and 7th Street shopping districts, F Street shopping distric ...

(opened October 16, 1959 at #490), forming a large shopping district. In 1967 the

Desert Fashion Plaza Desert Fashion Plaza, formerly known as Desert Inn Fashion Plaza, was an enclosed shopping mall located in Palm Springs, California. The mall was originally developed by the Home Savings and Loan Association, which sold the shopping center to ...

mall was built, I. Magnin opened there (closed 1992) and Saks closed its previous location and moved into a new larger store in the mall.

Joseph Magnin Co. The Joseph Magnin Company was a high-end specialty department store founded in San Francisco, California, by Joseph Magnin, 4th son of Isaac Magnin founder of the I. Magnin department store. Joseph Magnin Co. and I. Magnin Co. were rivals. His ...

opened a department store in the mall in 1969, meaning that together with a

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co., commonly known as Sears ( ), is an American chain of department stores and online retailer founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosen ...

at 611 Palm Canyon Dr., for two decades, downtown boasted seven department stores, plus the

Palm Springs Mall Palm Springs Mall, formerly known as Palm Springs Shopping Center and Palm Springs Shopping Center Mall, was an enclosed shopping mall in Palm Springs, California. Originally constructed as an open air shopping center, the center would expand an ...

to the east operating from 1959 through 2005.

References

External links

*
Article in ''Palm Springs Life'' about history of La PlazaArticle in ''Desert Sun'' about history of La Plaza
{{History of Retail in Southern California . 1936 establishments in California