Quick Facts
- Date: Public opening‑day celebration on August 19, 2017; opening festivities also held the prior day, August 18, 2017 (weekend grand reopening).
- Location: Crosstown Concourse, 1350 Concourse Ave., Memphis, TN 38104.
- Formerly: Sears Crosstown; original Sears grand opening on August 27, 1927.
- Project team: Led by nonprofit Crosstown Arts in partnership with Kemmons Wilson Companies and founding tenants.
- Scale and investment: Approximately $200 million adaptive‑reuse of about 1.1 million square feet into a mixed‑use “vertical urban village.”
- Dignitaries: Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland and Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell participated in the grand‑opening program.
Main Story
Nearly ninety years after its first ribbon‑cutting, the landmark Sears Crosstown building reopened to the public as Crosstown Concourse over the weekend of August 18–19, 2017. The Saturday celebration featured a building‑wide program of music, art, and open houses that introduced Memphians to a reimagined space for living, learning, health care, and the arts—an approach its developers call a “vertical urban village.” The event was timed to echo the site’s original August 1927 opening and underscored how a onetime catalog hub could once again serve the Bluff City in a new century. Organizers and local leaders emphasized the civic partnership that made the project possible, with Crosstown Arts and Kemmons Wilson Companies among the core collaborators.
The reuse converted roughly 1.1 million square feet of the historic complex into offices, classrooms, galleries, performance spaces, restaurants, retail, and mixed‑income housing. Media coverage and project documents at the time placed the redevelopment cost at around $200 million, reflecting a layered financing package and years of planning and construction. City officials later highlighted the project’s job creation—about 700 new jobs—and its daily foot traffic as proof that this Midtown anchor was once again a community hub for the 901.
Legacy
Since the 2017 grand reopening, Crosstown Concourse has been recognized nationally for design and community impact, including the Congress for the New Urbanism’s Grand Prize (2018). Preservation groups also note its LEED Platinum status and role as a model for large‑scale historic adaptive reuse. Today the complex stands as a living chapter of Memphis history—connecting neighborhoods a short drive from Beale Street, strengthening civic life in the 901, and showing how the Bluff City can renew historic assets for a new generation.
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