Westfield Chatswood


Westfield Chatswood is a large indoor shopping centre in the suburb of Chatswood in the Lower North Shore of Sydney.

Transport

The Metro North West & Bankstown and North Shore railway lines offer frequent services to Chatswood station which is a short walk from the centre.
Westfield Chatswood has bus connections operated by Busways, CDC NSW and Keolis Downer Northern Beaches services to the Sydney CBD, North Shore and Northern Sydney, as well as surrounding suburbs with bus stops on Victoria Avenue.
Westfield Chatswood also has a multi level car park with 2,831 spaces.

History

20th Century

1980s: opening

Westfield Shoppingtown Chatswood opened on 10 November 1987 and is the second major shopping centre to be built in Chatswood with the first being Chatswood Chase which opened in 1983 and Wallace Way and Lemon Grove in the 1980s. The $100 million centre was the 27th shopping town the Westfield Holdings Ltd has developed.
Westfield Shoppingtown Chatswood was located next to the free standing Grace Bros store which opened in 1961 and featured Target, Coles New World, Franklins supermarket and 120 speciality stores.

1990s: redevelopment

In early 1994 Rebel Sport opened its "Superstore" on level 5 opposite Toys "R" Us.
In February 1996 Westfield Trust purchased a half share in the Grace Bros development site from Coles Myer for $42.5 million with plans to incorporate it into a future redevelopment.
On 30 August 1996 $154 million redevelopment proposal from Westfield Trust to redevelop of part of the Grace Bros site and incorporate it into the existing centre was approved by Willoughby City Council. The new Grace Bros would be built into a new four-level department store on the former car park behind the existing store on Victoria Avenue. The redevelopment would add an eight-screen cinema complex, 127 speciality stores together with the existing Target, Franklins, Rebel Sport, Toys "R" Us and 150 speciality stores alongside the once completed Grace Bros department store. This would bring the total number of stores to 285 and the total floor area to 75,000m².
Work began on the $205 million redevelopment in February 1997. The first stage of the redevelopment was opened in November 1999 with the opening of the four-level Grace Bros department store, Coles supermarket on level 2, The Street precinct and 127 speciality stores.

21st Century

2000s

The final works of the $205 million redevelopment were completed in 2000 with the opening of restaurants on level 6 and outside on level 3 in March. The six-screen Hoyts cinema complex on level 7 opened in May 2000. The opening of Hoyts inside Westfield did not impact the trade of the nearby existing Hoyts cinema inside Mandarin Centre.
In late 2005, JB Hi-Fi opened its store on level 5 next to Toys "R" Us.
In 2008 Aldi opened its store on the space vacated by Food For Less.

2010s

Spanish clothing retailer Zara opened its store on 13 February 2014.
In July 2014, as part of a restructure of the Westfield Group, it came under the control of the Scentre Group.
In 2015 a $110 million upgrade to Westfield Chatswood commenced, with the centre increased from 77,000sqm to 80,000sqm of gross lettable area. The redevelopment was completed in November 2015 with H&M, Uniqlo, Mecca Maxima and a new relocated Rebel Sport all opened on 18 February 2016.
This development consists of:
  • Forty new stores
  • Four new international fashion stores, as well as some local fashion stores
  • Two-level entrance on Victoria Avenue reconfigured into a five-level mall which included a two-level flagship Topshop and Topman
  • Hawker Lane Asian dining restaurants precinct
  • A reduced regular food court

    Tenants

Westfield Chatswood has 81,093 m2 of floor space. The major retailers include Myer, Target, Aldi, Coles, Uniqlo, Zara, JB Hi-Fi, Rebel, Timezone and Hoyts Cinema.

Incidents and accidents

  • 24 September 2005, a 32-year-old woman fell from the sixth floor and straight onto a 42-year-old woman on the ground floor in an attempted suicide. Both women were taken to Royal North Shore Hospital and police are investigating.
  • 12 January 2016, A man fell from the fifth level and died. About 3:45 pm police were called to the centre following reports a man was standing on the wrong side of a railing. Police believe it was suicide.