Stores pour into Hammond Square

Even as malls across the country struggle to find retail, Hammond Square is chugging along. Stirling Properties, which is developing the newly renovated mall, has just signed a lease with the owners of Cafe Roma in New Orleans’ Lakeview community to open a location there for the popular Italian/Meditteranean bistro. Owner Thanh-Mai Nguyen opened the Lakeview restaurant in January 2007. Nguyen has since expanded to River Ranch in Lafayette and will open in the traditional neighborhood development Sugar Mill Pond in Broussard by the end of the year. No date is set yet for Hammond Square. Meanwhile, Beezie Landry, a sales and leasing executive with Stirling Properties, says the following additional openings are approaching: Santa Fe Cattle Company Restaurant, Friday; Albasha Greek Restaurant, next week; Best Buy, June 12; Verizon, end of June; Target, July 26; and T.J. Maxx, Aug. 3. Several more are planned for September. The new Hammond Square is designed as a power/lifestyle center and will be twice the size of the old mall. More than 60 tenants have signed. — Penny Font