Suburban Mall-Hopping: Old Orchard
Technically it’s now called the Westfield Shoppingtown at Old Orchard, but this Skokie-based mall has always been Old Orchard around here and will probably always be so. Indoor malls are starting to go out of style, but Old Orchard is an outdoor mall and remains a pleasant, attractive place to shop—at least during the warmer months.
Old Orchard isn’t as much a teen hangout as some of the other places in the area, although it does have a food court, a movie theater (separated into two locations) and lots of open space to lounge around in. It features a nice selection of upscale stores from Brighton Collectibles to Pottery Barn and Armani Exchange. The video game store just closed, unfortunately, but a new tea store called Teavana will open in its place soon. A Forever 21 is also coming. My personal favorites include Sephora, Crate and Barrel and Williams-Sonoma; I refuse to buy anything at Macy’s, since I’m still upset about the Marshall Fields thing.
This is also a great place to stroll your kids around, because there are lots of fountains and flowers, a fish pond in the summer, a maze over by Bloomingdale’s and a play dragon that they can crawl over while you’re visiting the Disney Store. You’ll also see sculptures and benches for seating (or for leaving bookcrossing.com books, which I’ve often seen done here). Kid and parent-friendly stores include Gap Baby, Gymboree, Mimi Maternity, Picture People and the movie theater, which has a movies for moms program weekly. There are also monthly KidOOdles kids’ events on the first Saturday of every month at 11 a.m., sponsored in part by the Skokie Public Library.
There’s a nice variety of food available for everyone. Restaurants include Potbelly’s for sandwiches, Johnny Rockets for burgers and Cheesecake Factory for any kind of comfort food you like. There’s a sports bar in Champps Americana and pizza at California Pizza Kitchen. The food court gives out free balloons to kids and features fast food staples like Subway’s, McDonald’s, Chinese, ice cream, pretzels and pizza. Starbucks and the Corner Bakery reside here too.
As with all malls parking can be challenging during certain types of year if you want to be very close to a particular store. And Old Orchard often holds tent events in one of its outlying lots, such as oriental rug sales. But there is plenty of garage parking, and once you get to know the place you’ll be able to get to where you need to go relatively quickly. In certain lots there are even a few spots for expectant/new mother parking.
Mall bathrooms are usually pretty clean, even in the food court. Old Orchard does get more crowded on school holidays, near Christmas and on weekends, but as a suburban mall the density is not too bad. And during the winter, if you like braving the weather you can practically have the place to yourself. If you enjoy the drawn-out experience of shopping, browsing and enjoying the outdoors, you’ll like coming here. Go to http://westfield.com/oldorchard
for more information.
