"We have been proactively working behind the scenes on future plans to enhance our shopping center."
That's what a spokeswoman for GGP, Plaza Frontenac's landlord, told CoStar News after Saks Global announced it was shuttering the Frontenac store. It reads like the standard reassurance a property manager issues whenever a big name packs up. Except in this case, the sentence turned out to be true faster than anyone watching the mall's tenant roster expected. Saks closed for good by the end of May. A new store with a line out the door opened five days into June. If you shop at Plaza Frontenac regularly, the story this year isn't really about what left. It's about how quickly something else took its place, and what that pace tells you about the rest of the center.
The Anchor That Opened With the Mall
Saks Fifth Avenue wasn't just another department store at Plaza Frontenac. It moved there from Central West End, where it had operated since the early 1950s, when the mall opened in 1974, and it anchored the property alongside Neiman Marcus for more than fifty years. That pairing made Frontenac one of only nine malls in the country to carry both luxury department stores under one roof at the same time, a distinction that shaped how the center was built and marketed from day one.
On March 6, 2026, Saks Global filed a WARN notice confirming the Frontenac location would close as part of a nationwide reduction of 12 Saks Fifth Avenue and three Neiman Marcus stores. Roughly 65 employees were laid off between May 6 and May 31. By the last day of May, the store that had opened with the mall itself was gone.
Neiman Marcus stayed put. The two brands have shared a parent company since a 2024 merger, and Frontenac's Neiman Marcus is the one the company chose to keep running at full strength.
Days, Not Months, Before Something Filled the Space
Here's the part that separates Frontenac from the cautionary tales you'll read about other malls losing a Saks. Retail analysts told CoStar that an anchor closure often triggers a "downward spiral," where co-tenancy clauses let smaller tenants renegotiate rent or walk away once foot traffic in that wing drops. That's the fear. It's also not what happened here, at least not yet.
Aritzia, the Vancouver-based women's clothing brand that had never had a Missouri location, opened its first Missouri store on the first floor of Plaza Frontenac on June 4, 2026, a roughly 10,000-square-foot shop. The mall had confirmed the deal the previous December, but the timing of the actual opening landed just days after Saks closed for good. The nearest Aritzia before that had been in Leawood, Kansas.
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| March 6, 2026 | Saks Global files WARN notice, confirms the Frontenac store will close |
| May 31, 2026 | Last day Saks Fifth Avenue operates at Plaza Frontenac |
| June 4, 2026 | Aritzia opens its first Missouri store on the mall's first floor |
Aritzia wasn't the only new-to-market brand willing to bet on Frontenac even as the anchor drama played out. Flower Child, the health-focused fast-casual concept from Phoenix-based Fox Restaurant Concepts, took over the former Saint Louis Bread Co. spot next to the mall as its first Missouri location, part of a chain founded by James Beard-nominated restaurateur Sam Fox. That deal was in motion well before the Saks announcement, which is worth sitting with. National retail and restaurant groups were choosing Frontenac to enter the Missouri market at the same time a fifty-year anchor was walking out the door.
The Sign at the Garage Is New Too
Here's a change that affects your Tuesday errand run more than the anchor swap does. Plaza Frontenac introduced paid parking in 2026, a shift from the free-parking model the mall had operated under for its entire history. If you've pulled up an older listing for the Landmark cinema or a ticketing site, you've probably seen language promising free parking in the mall garage. That information hasn't caught up. Commercial real estate data on the property flags the new paid structure directly, and it's the kind of quiet operational change that doesn't make headlines the way a Saks closure does, but shows up the next time you swing by for a quick return or a matinee.
What Regulars Can Still Count On
Not everything is in motion. If your routine at Plaza Frontenac has nothing to do with department stores, most of it is unchanged.
- Neiman Marcus remains open, along with Mariposa, its in-store restaurant known for the Mandarin Orange Soufflé
- Fleming's Prime Steakhouse, remodeled in 2024, is still running under longtime steakhouse veteran Ian Rockwell
- 801 Local, the more casual offshoot of the Des Moines-based 801 Restaurant Group, remains a lunch and happy-hour fixture with its 6,000-square-foot space and covered west-facing patio
- Brio Tuscan Grille and Bricktop's are both still part of the mall's out-parcel dining lineup
The Landmark Plaza Frontenac Cinema, the only spot in the immediate area still showing independent and foreign film, is also still screening movies on its six screens. That continuity comes with a caveat worth knowing if you're a regular there: public court filings have shown the mall's landlord pursuing legal action against Landmark Theatres over more than $274,000 in unpaid rent. Landmark has already closed its Delmar Loop and Hi-Pointe locations, leaving Frontenac as the chain's only remaining St. Louis-area theater. Nothing about the current schedule has changed, but it's the kind of history that explains why the cinema's future comes up more than you'd expect for a business that's still open.
The Big Question Nobody's Answered Yet
As of this writing, GGP hasn't named what's replacing the Saks footprint. The spokeswoman's comment about "future plans to enhance our shopping center" is still the most specific public statement on record. What we do have is context: as of February 2026, Plaza Frontenac's occupancy sat around 87 percent, with vacancy near 13 percent, a rate commercial real estate trackers describe as solid for a regional mall carrying this much retail space. That's not a property in freefall. It's a property with one large, high-profile gap and a track record this year of filling smaller ones quickly.
Whatever moves into the old Saks space will take longer to finalize than a boutique lease, simply because of the size involved. In the meantime, the mall's actual daily experience, the shops open, the tables you can book, the parking you'll now pay for, has already reshuffled more than most people who don't live nearby probably realize.
If watching how a place like Plaza Frontenac evolves has you thinking more broadly about what's changing in your own corner of Frontenac, that's a conversation Adam Briggs has regularly with residents and buyers across the area. Request a personalized home valuation with Adam and get a read on your own property that's grounded in what's actually happening in the neighborhood right now.
