Lloyd Center memories linger for Portlanders
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The Lloyd Center as it appeared in 1964, with Holladay Park seen in the background. Photo: Courtesy of the Portland City Archives, AP/51574
For more than 60 years, Lloyd Center, which is being demolished later this year, has been a cultural touchstone for Northeast Portland and the broader region.
Why it matters: A mall that endures for decades becomes more than retail space — it becomes part of people's personal history.
- We asked readers to share their favorite Lloyd Center memories.
What you're saying: Myrna Jensen, who said she was old enough to remember the mall when it was still primarily outdoors, recalled spending Easter there.
- "They set up a spring farm scene and had live rabbits you could pet," Jensen told Axios in an email. "At Rose Festival, they would put up giant photos of the princesses and the queen. As a little girl, I'd sit and dream that I would be up there some day."
Kathy Lovrien remembered walking through Macy's to take her 7-year-old daughter to ice skating lessons.
- "On the way back we would stop off at the perfume counter, try all the samples and collect sample cards to take home. We would get back home absolutely reeking with scent," Lovrien said. "Her Dad would have to open a window after we arrived!"
Susan Kelly had fond memories of Ella Fitzgerald serenading the crowd at the mall's grand opening in the 1960s.
- "She was terrific, singing with lots of scat, 'It never rains at Lloyd Center' under a tent while the whole crowd got rained on!'"
"My mother and aunt in their 80s would go and walk at Lloyd Center several times a week," Shannon Pernetti told us. "They felt safe there and stimulated by the mall."
Many of your memories involved the ice rink.
- Elizabeth Steiner took her oldest child to skate for a third birthday celebration. "I hadn't skated in a long time and was 36 weeks pregnant at the time so we made quite the pair on the ice."
Diane Miller recalled getting free pumpkins at the mall around Halloween.
- "Louie Armstrong played a free concert there," Miller said. "There were live animals at the Christmas display with Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus. We won $300 in toys at Toyland."
Greg Lang worked in an office on the third floor and once encountered the actor Sam Eliot gazing down at the ice rink waiting for an older woman who was shopping in Meier & Frank.
- When she came out, the actor happily grabbed her purchases because it "doesn't matter if you're a big movie/TV star; you take the bags and carry them for your mom."
The bottom line: For many Portlanders, Lloyd Center's legacy will linger — like the sweet aroma emanating from Morrow's Nut House — long after it's gone.