Companies including Macy’s, Nordstrom, Kohl’s, and IKEA are rolling out small-format stores around the country, often in suburban areas, as they try other ways to connect with their customers.

Industry experts speaking at the ULI Fall Meeting said pickleball is just one of the ways developers are taking a fresh look at the retail space as malls seek to rework their tenant mix: by including more outdoor spaces.

After 75 years in operation, Bellevue Square in Bellevue, Washington, is an example of a living organic retail center for the community it serves.

ULI Chicago, with support from the City of Chicago Department of Planning and Development, is in the process of conducting two Technical Assistance Panels as part of the City of Chicago’s Central City recovery planning efforts. In partnership with DPD and The Magnificent Mile Association, ULI Chicago convened a multi-disciplinary panel of real estate development experts to develop recommendations for redevelopment in the City of Chicago’s downtown.

Much discussion has taken place in recent years about the do’s and don’ts of design for development of mixed-use projects, but the global pandemic has changed the ballgame. In a concurrent session at the 2021 ULI Virtual Spring Meeting, experts at CallisonRTKL and industry-leading voices explored the rules to break when designing for a new consumer mind-set.

ULI MEMBER–ONLY CONTENT: Owning retail space has been challenging since the Great Recession. You likely know the reasons why: overbuilding, the internet, rapacious private equity, too many lackluster tenants. You also know that every move you make—every breath you take—is recorded by your mobile phone. This latter circumstance has allowed a clever company to develop possibly the most useful tool for commercial real estate since Hewlett Packard introduced the HP-12C financial calculator in 1981.

Well-prepared food of practically any cuisine you can imagine, delivered to you with the help of busy drones and robots. In the not-too-distant future, this could be an everyday reality for people in cities all over the world, said a speaker at the the ULI Asia Pacific Leadership Convivium.

The COVID-19 lockdown imposed by San Francisco in late February devastated the city’s small, independent businesses, and especially its restaurant scene. But creative city policies could help nimble retailers survive, panelists said at the ULI Virtual Fall Meeting session titled “Vibrant Retail Streets in the Age of E-tail and COVID-19: Is It Time for ‘Retail First’ City Policies?”

Christina Contreras, principal and founder of Living Ecology Studio in Denver, has been selected as the ULI/Martin Bucksbaum Senior Visiting Fellow. During her one-year fellowship, Contreras will explore how privately owned and managed “third places” can better contribute to individual and community health and well-being, and will develop a “pattern book” for designers and developers to create welcoming and thriving privately owned “third places.”

ULI MEMBER–ONLY CONTENT: Despite the challenges facing the retail sector in 2020, South Florida’s Aventura Mall has continued to reinvent itself as a retail destination.