Major Shopping Centers
Los Angeles County

& Other Shopping Areas of Note

The Grove in the Fairfax neighborhood of Los Angeles. Los Angeles Almanac Photo.

Los Angeles County, by far, has the largest (and, we argue, most exciting) retail landscape of any single county in the United States. The U.S. Census Bureau reports for Los Angeles County, that, in 2016, there were 29,017 retail stores (the 32 shopping malls listed below comprise about 15% of that), 425,475 employees and a payroll of $13.3 billion. These numbers are about double those for the number two county (Cook County, Chicago, Illinois, metropolitan area).

In terms of total retail space, Wikipedia's list of shopping centers by size show Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance (2.5 million square feet) and Lakewood Center in Lakewood (2.1 million square feet) as respectively the 6th and 20th largest shopping malls in the nation. From 1981 until the 1992 debut of the Mall of America in Minnesota, Del Amo Fashion Center reigned as the largest shopping mall in the nation. The Westfield Topanga & The Village shopping center in Canoga Park (California's first enclosed mall), however, is not in Wikipedia's list. That center is actually slightly larger than Lakewood Center.

Largest Shopping Centers/Malls in Los Angeles County

Ordered by Amount of Retail Space

* Formerly Hollywood and Highland Center

Topanga Plaza (now Westfield Topanga & The Village), opened in Canoga Park in 1964 as California's first enclosed shopping mall.

Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, opened in 1947 in the Baldwin Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, was one of the first regional shopping centers built specifically with the automobile in mind.

Other Shopping Areas of Note in Los Angeles County

Ordered by Community

Two Japanese confectionary shops (wagashi) in Little Tokyo are among the oldest food establishments in Los Angeles. The shop Fugetsu-do was founded in 1903 and is said to be the oldest food establishment still operating in Los Angeles.

During the 2000s, a number of Los Angeles County shopping malls disappeared or were completely renovated as "open air" shopping centers. These included Fallbrook Mall in West Hills (first opened in 1964 - now Fallbrook Center), Sherman Oaks Galleria (first opened in the 1970s), and Whittwood Mall in Whittier (first opened in 1958 - now Whittwood Town Center). and Santa Monica Place (first opened in 1980).

Long Beach Plaza, a two level regional mall opened in the 1982, went into eventual decline and was demolished in 2000 (except for the parking structure). The location was rebuilt as an open air retail/residential district.

Hawthorne Plaza, opened in Hawthorne in 1977, once boasted 130 stores. The mall declined and closed in 1999.

In 2018, developer Rick Caruso opened Palisades Village in 2018 (see Other Shopping Areas of Note below), a significant departure from his other retail shopping centers, The Grove and Americana. The redeveloped commercial center in the middle of the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles is considerably smaller, featuring only 125,000 square feet of retail space (in contrast to 600,000 square feet at the Grove). However, following a series of meetings with local residents to discuss concerns and desires, it is closely tailored to the surrounding community and offers the same creative style, care and attention-to-detail that is characteristic of Caruso’s other shopping centers. The selection of shops and restaurants are “curated” to focus on the surrounding neighborhood and smaller in size than those found at much larger centers. Exterior storefront styles are differentiated to avoid a “cookie-cutter” look. Caruso envisions replicating this center as “new blueprint for retail” in other Los Angeles area neighborhoods.