Fashion retailer Forever 21 is readying a move to larger space inside Westfarms mall, quarters once occupied by the former Rainforest Café.
Rainforest’s abrupt closing during the weekend blizzard caught just about everyone by surprise except the mall’s operator The Taubman Cos., which had known for months that the jungle-themed restaurant wasn’t renewing its 12- to 13-year-old, 16,000-square-foot lease, Westfarms General Manager Kevin Keenan said Tuesday.
Forever 21 for some time has been eager to enlarge its 8,500-square-foot Westfarms footprint closer to its typical store size of 20,000 to 25,000 square feet, Keenan said.
Combining Rainforest’s space with area that retailers Things Remembered and Champs Sporting Goods swapped for space elsewhere in the shopping center will provide Forever 21 enough room for its new home, he said.
Meantime, the women’s clothier’s old quarters have been spoken for by another retailer that Keenan declined to immediately identify.
In addition, the mall is open to replacing Rainforest with another restaurant tenant if a suitable candidate emerges, Keenan said. P.F. Chang and Brio were the last casual-dining eateries opened several years ago in the mall.
Rainforest Café is owned by Landry Restaurants of Houston, Texas.
According to an emailed statement from Keith Beitler, Landry’s chief operating officer in its Specialty Restaurants Division:
“Due to our lease not being renewed, Rainforest Café has closed its operation at Westfarms Mall.”
Beitler said Rainforest’s other East Coast locations in Burlington, Mass., and Edison, N.J. remain open.
The mall straddles the Farmington-West Hartford town lines.
