Take a Walk Down Memory Lane With '90s Mall Staples
How could we forget those creamsicle smoothies from Orange Julius?
Grabbing a tube top at Limited Too, sipping on an Orange Julius, smelling body spray at Bath & Body Works — if you were a teen in the '90s, so many of your best memories were made at the mall. Once the community epicenter of suburban areas in the later decades of the 20th century, commercial malls have been on the decline for a while now, taking with them some iconic stores of the era. But once upon a time, malls were the place to be, as anyone who was a kid or teen at the time will tell you. Read on for the best trends, stores and shopping habits that every '90s teen will remember — a few of which still live on today.
Nabbing extra baggy denim jeans at Anchor Blue
The '90s were all about grunge and denim, and no wardrobe was complete with at least one pair of baggy jeans.
Scouring the bins at Filene's Basement
Your mom probably took you here to buy you those wardrobe staples that you were constantly growing out of.
Creamsicle smoothies from Orange Julius
They were allegedly smoothies, which implied a level of healthiness, but really the frothy, creamy beverage just tasted like liquid candy.
RELATED: 25 Healthy Smoothie Recipes to Brighten Up Your Mornings
Perusing books and reading 'CosmoGirl' without buying
The shopping-mall bookstore B. Dalton basically rode on the back of malls' success from the ’60s through the ’90s (and then lost popularity when they did). It provided the literary competition to Waldenbooks, another now-defunct shopping-mall bookstore.
Buying all the body butter at The Body Shop
What teen did not love body butter? The Body Shop always seemed to have a more sophisticated je ne sais quoi than Bath & Body Works.
RELATED: 15 Best Body Lotions and Creams to Hydrate and Soothe Skin
Starting a rock collection from the selection at The Nature Company
The Nature Company was an eclectic, out-of-the-ordinary shop — selling amethysts and tiger eyes, telescopes, and other random "nature" bobbles—and for that reason, it was a welcome balance to the regular clothes shopping.
Riding a sugar high at Sweet Factory
The mall was one of the few places where kids weren't under the purview of our guardians, and naturally that meant devouring all the sugar they could handle, without judgement.
RELATED: 35 Homemade Christmas Candy Recipes to Make Your Holiday Extra Sweet
Feeding the tube-top frenzy at Wet Seal
Wet Seal took over Contempo Casuals (a '90s store made immortal in Clueless) and for a time delivered on teens' need for ruched tube tops and the shortest denim skirts.
Grabbing a CD and a graphic T-shirt to match at F.Y.E.
F.Y.E. had the latest music and the clothes to make it look like you knew a lot about music.
Limited Too, for the tweens not yet ready for The Limited
Seemingly just one small step up from Lisa Frank, the color and glitter of Limited Too enabled pre-adolescents to keep up with the older kids, proffering training bras, sparkly nail polish, and girls' first bikinis. (And let us not forget Myra, the Disney star with the 2001 hit cover of "Dancing in the Street.")
Freeze-framing in photo booths with your gang
If you don't have a strip of four photos with your friends of missing the first shot, goofy faces, kissy faces, and serious faces, did you even live through the ’90s?
Learning self-care at Bath & Body Works
Whether for C.O. Bigelow rose salve or to discover your signature scent by spritzing yourself with all the body mists, Bath & Body Works supplied adolescent girls with entry into the cosmetic world of women. The musky scent of Moonlight Path elevated your age by at least a grade level.
Celebrity tours catering to adoring fans in malls
Since malls had become meccas of teenhood by the ’90s, they also became the site of many a celebrity tour. Here we have Mark-Paul Gosselaar and Tiffani Thiessen on a Saved by the Bell Tour in 1990.
Refuge jeans and accessories at Charlotte Russe
Charlotte Russe seemed to have everything you needed to make a whole new outfit, including tons of dresses for when school dances came around, but the cheap jewelry, hair accessories, and Refuge jeans were a particular draw.
Finding standard and unusual tech at RadioShack
Whether you needed batteries, chargers, or tape recorders or were a nerd more interested tech like robot coin banks and remote cars, the personal electronics store had you covered.
Baggy pants and chain wallets for alt teens at Gadzooks
Alt teens who probably dabbled in listening to Korn came here for JNCO jeans and punk-style tees.
Arizona jeans and the annual family portrait
If you didn't have access to a Glamour Shots at your local mall, then you at least had the portrait center at JCPenneys, where you and your siblings were likely forced to take a cheesy annual photo together. And let us not forget Arizona Jeans Co. and its casual cool clothes and jeans for the new school year.
Trying the smart home tech you didn't know you needed at The Sharper Image
Like this 10-year-old, we'd all flock to Sharper Image to test out the massage chairs that we'd likely never buy.
Biting into hot cinnamon rolls at Cinnabon
A trip to the mall was not complete without a snack or lunch break. The huge, cinnamon-laden spiral of warm dough smothered in icing was almost worth the visit in itself.
"Goody got it" when it came to records and celebrity musicians
Once an independently owned chain, record shop Sam Goody's was bought by the American Can Company, which brought it to malls in the late 1970s. By the 1990s, big-name music groups were showing up at the store to sign their records and play a gig … In their prime, in 1997, the Hanson brothers performed at Sam Goody's.
Jaime is a writer covering travel, social issues, health and lifestyle. She has written for Good Housekeeping, Well+Good, Time Out, Food52, and PureWow."
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