Building permits were issued for the 850,000 square foot Georgia Square mall in 1979, with
JCPenney,
Belk, and
Sears going in as anchors.
Davison's was the planned fourth anchor, but the company was lagging behind reaching an agreement at the time. This would be worked out, however, and the mall officially opened on February 11, 1981, with all 4 anchors present and roughly 100 stores opening their doors. The mall was specifically designed to be "aesthetically pleasing in every respect", with 500 trees in the parking lot, and elevators plus escalators inside the two-level mall. Notable persons present at the
ribbon cutting ceremony were the then mayor of Athens, Lauren Colle, the project manager of
CBL Associates Eugene Schimpf, and CBL President Charles Lebovitz, among others. In July 1983, it is reported by manager John Jolley that Georgia Square mall had an occupancy of 98.5 percent, up from 88 percent at opening day. It is also stated that around 11 percent of occupancy is taken up by locally owned business. In 2007, the mall began a renovation to the exterior entrances in the rear as well as an updated look on the interior. However, even with two overhauls, the mall is now much like it was when it opened. The only anchor change was in the name of Davison's; it was converted to
Macy's in 1986,
Rich's in 1998,
Rich's-Macy's in 2003 and back to Macy's in 2005. As of February 2017, Macy's has since closed. On August 6, 2019, Sears announced that it would close its doors down around fall for good as part of a plan to close 26 stores. On June 4, 2020, JCPenney announced that it would close its store at the mall as part of a plan to close 154 stores nationwide. After JCPenney closed in October 2020, Belk became the only remaining anchor store. In early 2022, an Athens construction syndicate proposed a
mixed-use development for the site of the mall, which would include more than 1,000 residential apartments and almost of new retail and restaurant space. Some of the existing retail space, including the sole remaining anchor store, Belk, would be retained, but the rest of the mall would be demolished. ==References==