A Marriage Made in Accounting We’re going to take a look back at the biggest bridal couple Torrance has seen. Only Christo, the one who wraps whole communities in plastic, could have the scale to design a wedding dress large enough for such a couple. Torrance of the 50s and 60s had a couple; in fact they lived next door, only separated by Carson Street. Much like the Montagues and Capulets, their respective parents, Del Amo Estate Co. and Bullock’s Real Estate Corp., were in competition with one another. One was decidedly popular, shopping at Sears and the Broadway while the other shopped at I. Magnin and Bullock’s. Would these kids bridge their differences and unite? Have you guessed who this happy couple was? Yes, it was the marriage of the malls. Del Amo Center was to marry and truly bridge its differences with the Del Amo Fashion Square. Perhaps the Del Amo Financial Center acted as best man.

Original outdoors Del Amo Center (Photo CSUDH Digital Archives) Torrance was fast growing; the factories of the east were giving away to the retail and residential areas of the west. As Myron Wenom of Coldwell Banker said, “The many manufacturing plants located here enable the residents to be employed near the house and there is a diversification of purchasing power to attract shoppers to all types of stores…” Still, it took two years before a site was selected. Indeed, the city was not built out as it is now; there were still arguments over light industry vs. residential vs. retail zoning. One part of our couple was born in the late 50s when two large retail stores bought 20 acres each, in the heart of the city, to become the Del Amo Center.

Del Amo Center, circa 1960s (CSUDH Digital Archives)

The other part of the couple came along, across Carson Street, in the mid 60s. Bullock’s, who was doing well in other fashion centers it created in Southern California, thought Torrance would be a good place to build. With Del Amo Center doing well and the future Del Amo Financial Center planned, it seemed a more tony shopping experience was needed. Bullock’s buyers would choose every item, “expressly for the enviable way of life that makes this [Torrance] the Southland’s most unique residential and recreational community.” Just four years after it was born, the new Fashion Square would put on a lot of weight, adding an east wing with theaters, two major anchors and internalizing itself. It would take another decade of courting, and the same owner buying up both halves of the mall, but the boy/girl next door finally got hitched in November of 1981. Although there was some tension, the marriage has been a successful one. One that only an earthquake or change in shopping habits is likely to dissolve.