Anna Mazarakis / Business Insider
Part of the former Macy's store at the Landmark Mall in Alexandria, Virginia, has been turned into a homeless shelter.
- The Macy's store at the Landmark Mall in Alexandria, Virginia - and the mall itself - closed in January 2017.
- A year later, a homeless shelter in search of a temporary home constructed a temporary shelter within the old Macy's store. The Carpenter's Shelter moved into the old Macy's store in June.
- To hear the full story, listen to Business Insider's podcast, "Household Name."
ALEXANDRIA, Virginia - What happens when a homeless shelter becomes homeless?
If you're the Carpenter's Shelter in Alexandria, Virginia, you move into an old Macy's store in the closed Landmark Mall.
Both the Macy's and the mall in which it operated closed in January 2017. According to an executive at the Howard Hughes Corporation, the real estate company that owns the mall, the closing was a long time coming.
"When you show up on DeadMalls.com probably a decade before you close, it really is kind of the marketplace telling you you should get a different use there," said Mark Bulmash, senior vice president for development at Howard Hughes.
At the same time, the Carpenter's Shelter had a problem: it had been located in an old Department of Motor Vehicles office for about 20 years, but it was getting old, and they needed to do a lot of renovations. The shelter staff decided to tear down the building and rebuild a totally new shelter in its place. In the meantime, they moved into the former Macy's store in the defunct Landmark Mall.
There are very few signs that Macy's used to exist in the space.
"There are people who still come in and think this is a Macy's," said the Carpenter's Shelter's director of programming, Blair Copeland, in a recent interview with Business Insider's new podcast, "Household Name."
"Occasionally, there'll be somebody that says, 'I want to return something,' and I'm like, 'How could you?' Stop. First of all, the mall has been closed for like 2 years. And secondly, it doesn't look like Macy's anymore."
From the outside, a sign for the Carpenter's Shelter covers smudged letters showing where the Macy's sign used to be displayed. Inside, the only real display of the old Macy's is the carpet and tile that line the floors.
See inside the shelter in the photos below: