{"id":35449,"date":"2026-06-24T10:02:25","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:02:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/?p=35449"},"modified":"2026-06-24T10:02:25","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T15:02:25","slug":"the-dying-days-of-exton-square-mall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/?p=35449","title":{"rendered":"The Dying Days of Exton Square Mall"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Exton Square Mall, where I worked for Electronics Boutique after college, is closing for good next week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here&#8217;s a walkthrough video of the almost abandoned mall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Exton Square Mall Final Walkthrough | Exton Pennsylvania \" width=\"750\" height=\"422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yfmdt_JA_5c?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 2:17, the Waldenbooks.  I did a book signing there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">By the way, I loved the kiosks at Exton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 3:00, we have the old Auntie Anne&#8217;s shop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 3:04, the upstairs entrance to Strawbridges.  I don&#8217;t remember precisely which department was there, but my mom worked there for a time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 3:30, the Disney store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 3:55, the entrance of J.C. Penney&#8217;s.  She didn&#8217;t show it, but Wizards of the Coast was next to it on the left.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 4:30, give or take, she walked past where EB Kids was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 8:11, there&#8217;s the Sam Goody.  I bought so many CDs there.  It honestly looks the same as it did in 2002.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 9:57, Babbage&#8217;s was on the right.  It looks like GameStop remodeled it, because it used to have an all white facade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 11:00, my sister and I had our picture taken with Santa Claus there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 13:30, that was Kirkland&#8217;s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 17:00, yes, that was the fountain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 18:00, Victoria&#8217;s Secret.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 21:00, that was my hall.  The jewelry store was, IIRC, a Gordon&#8217;s.  There was a Zale&#8217;s right above it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 21:07, the Shoe Mall on the left used to be a Shoe Dept, and beyond it was a hobby shop, then a Radio Shack.  On the right was a Nokia store and then a mattress store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 21:21, Gold Buyers used to be a tobacco shop, though they also sold other things, like chess sets.  And, just beyond it, my Electronics Boutique.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 21:30, on the left, Lens Crafters.  Or maybe it was Pearle Vision.  But I think it was Lens Crafters.  The shop at the base of the escalator was a barber shop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 21:34, that patch of carpet.  There was more carpeting there (it was pulled up and replaced with tile at some point) and two leather couches.  I did so many interviews there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 22:07, that was Cinnabon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 24:21, I came out of that parking garage entrance in 2000 on a snowy, icy day, hit the pavement, and did a 720 in the road.  How I did not wreck or kill someone I do now know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That&#8217;s a trip down memory lane.  Pour one out for the Exton Square Mall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Exton Square Mall, where I worked for Electronics Boutique after college, is closing for good next week. Here&#8217;s a walkthrough video of the almost abandoned mall. At 2:17, the Waldenbooks. I did a book signing there. By the way, I loved the kiosks at Exton. At 3:00, we have the old Auntie Anne&#8217;s shop. At<a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/?p=35449\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">&#8220;The Dying Days of Exton Square Mall&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[5237,5464],"class_list":["post-35449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","tag-eb-games-2","tag-exton-square-mall","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}