Eddie Bauer closed its doors at Southlake Town Square this year. So did Francesca's. If you've shopped Grand Avenue for the last decade, that probably didn't surprise you. Both brands have been shrinking their physical footprint across the country for years.
What's filling those gaps is the part worth paying attention to. Rothy's, the shoe brand that spent most of its life selling exclusively through its own website, is now open at 307 Grand Avenue East. Reformation, the sustainable fashion label that also built its name online before it ever leased a storefront, has a space lined up near lululemon for later this year. On Running, the performance footwear brand, is aiming for its first-ever Tarrant County location here. None of these three grew up as mall tenants. They grew up as direct-to-consumer brands, and Southlake is where they're choosing to test a physical presence in North Texas.
What Actually Left, and Why It's Different From What's Coming
Eddie Bauer and Francesca's weren't unusual closures. Both chains have been pulling back from brick-and-mortar retail broadly, and their exits from Southlake read more like a national retrenchment than a local rejection. That's the old model: a national chain leases space in every mid-size shopping center in the country, then closes stores as the model stops working.
The replacements don't fit that pattern. Rothy's, Reformation, and On Running each built loyal customer bases online first, then made deliberate, selective choices about which physical markets earned a store. A brand that already knows exactly who its customer is from years of direct sales data isn't guessing when it opens a location. It's confirming something it already suspected about the buying power and taste of the people who live nearby.
The New Arrivals, By the Numbers
Here's what's actually landed or is on the calendar for Southlake Town Square in 2026:
- Rothy's — now open at 307 Grand Avenue East, selling its recycled-material footwear and accessories.
- Reformation — slated for a roughly 2,000-square-foot space at 213 Grand Avenue, near lululemon, with a late-2026 target.
- Crate & Barrel — aiming for a nearly 19,000-square-foot space, with an opening originally targeted around the Fourth of July.
- On Running — expected to occupy about 6,000 square feet at 415 Grand Avenue East, between Alo and Sunglass Hut, in the second half of the year. It will be the brand's first Tarrant County store.
- Ascension Coffee — the Dallas-born, chef-driven café is targeting an August opening in the former Corner Bakery space at 100 State Street.
That's more than 30,000 square feet of new retail turning over in a single year, according to reporting on the property's leasing activity, and almost none of it is a brand you'd have recognized from a 2010s shopping center directory.
Jason Kasal, the leasing director for Kite Realty Group, which operates the property, described the strategy in fairly standard property-management language: the goal is brands that "align with the lifestyle of our community." That's the kind of quote every shopping center gives every reporter about every tenant announcement. What it doesn't say out loud is that the actual brands doing the aligning have almost all skipped the traditional retail rollout entirely until now. The alignment isn't just about income level or aesthetic. It's about a set of shoppers who found these brands online first and are now being met with a physical option close to home.
The Same Rotation Is Happening at the Coffee Counter
Corner Bakery's exit and Ascension Coffee's arrival tell a smaller version of the same story. Corner Bakery is a national fast-casual chain with locations from coast to coast. Ascension Coffee started in Dallas as a single, chef-driven café built around sourcing and menu development rather than a standardized national playbook. It's expanding into Southlake the way a growing regional operator expands, not the way a franchise fills a real estate gap.
If you've watched Ascension Coffee's Dallas locations build a following, the choice of Southlake as an expansion market says something about where that company sees its next customer base sitting. It's a smaller bet than Crate & Barrel or On Running, but it fits the same pattern: brands that built a reputation somewhere else are choosing to plant a second or third flag here rather than the other way around.
If You're Headed to Town Square This Month
There's a practical wrinkle worth knowing about before you plan a visit. A city contractor is currently completing concrete enhancement repairs at three locations inside Town Square, including a stretch of Federal Way, running from August 10 through August 28, with work scheduled between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. on active days. That's a live construction window right now, not a future project, so if you're headed to the square this week, expect some sidewalk detours around those specific areas.
It's a small thing next to a wave of new storefronts, but it's exactly the kind of detail that only shows up if you're actually paying attention to what's happening on the ground rather than skimming a press release about new tenants.
Why the Retail Rotation Matters More Than It Looks
None of this changes what Town Square is at its core. The property still functions as the community's gathering space as much as its shopping district. This summer's Stars and Stripes celebration in July drew families back to the lawn for fireworks, food trucks, and a lineup that included The Inspiration Band and a tribute act called Fire and Heart. That kind of event doesn't care whether the storefront behind it sells shoes from a mall brand or a direct-to-consumer one.
But the tenant mix does say something about how outside companies are reading this market. When a shoe brand or a clothing label that spent a decade selling only online decides its next physical store belongs in Southlake rather than a dozen other North Texas suburbs, that's a data point about the neighborhood, not just about retail trends. It suggests these companies see enough repeat customers, enough disposable income, and enough foot traffic here to justify the overhead of a physical lease, something they avoided for years everywhere else.
For anyone who already calls this area home, that's worth noticing next time you're walking past a storefront that used to be something else entirely. The stores changing hands aren't just filling vacancies. They're a rough proxy for who these national brands think their next customer actually is, and right now, that customer looks a lot like a Southlake resident.
If you're curious about how shifts like this tend to ripple into the broader Tarrant County housing picture, our Tarrant County neighborhood guide tracks the bigger patterns alongside the local color. And if you ever want to talk through what's changing in your corner of the DFW suburbs, Live Well with Nichelle is always glad to chat. Let's Connect.
