Garden State Plaza
Westfield Garden State Plaza as seen in July 2014 by AMC parking lot.
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| Location | Paramus, New Jersey |
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| Address | 1 Garden State Plaza, Paramus, NJ 07652 |
| Opening date | May 25, 1957 |
| Developer | Macy's |
| Management | Westfield Corporation |
| Owner | Westfield Corporation |
| No. of stores and services | 335 (As of March 2014) |
| No. of anchor tenants | 5 |
| Total retail floor area | 2,118,718 sq ft (196,835.3 m2) |
| No. of floors | 2 (anchors have 3 except Lord & Taylor) |
| Parking | Parking lot, parking garage, and valet parking with 10,796 parking spaces. |
| Public transit access |
 NJ Transit bus: 163, 171, 175, 707, 709, 756, 758, 770 |
| Website | Westfield.com/GardenStatePlaza |
Westfield Garden State Plaza is a two-story, upscale shopping mall located in Paramus, New Jersey, owned and managed by the Westfield Corporation, and located at the intersection of Route 4 and Route 17 near the Garden State Parkway, about 15 miles west of Manhattan. With 2,118,718 sq ft (196,835.3 m2) of leasable space, and housing over 300 stores, it is the largest mall in New Jersey, the third-largest mall in the New York metropolitan area, and one of the highest-revenue producing malls in the United States. Its department store anchors are J.C. Penney, Lord & Taylor, Macy's, Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom. It was the first large scale shopping mall in New Jersey.
The mall had sales of $500 per square foot in 2013, about $320 above the national average; Garden State Plaza is one of the most profitable malls in the country.
Garden State Plaza was built in 1957 by the Muscarelle Construction Company for owner/developer R.H. Macy & Co. as an open-air shopping "plaza".
The original anchor was Bamberger's (owned by R.H. Macy since 1929). Gimbels and J.C. Penney were added in 1958. Total construction costs were $26 million in 1957 for the mall and its original group of 90 stores.
Garden State Plaza drew much business from nearby New York towns and cities, whose shoppers wandered across state lines to take advantage of New Jersey's lower sales taxes and its policy that exempted clothing purchases from sales tax. By 1961, it was the world's largest mall.
The mall was enclosed between 1981 and 1984 in response to competitive pressure from newer fully enclosed malls such as the Willowbrook Mall in nearby Wayne. Later in the 1980's, a lower level was added by converting a former basement truck tunnel into retail space. The existing J.C.Penney basement was given a new entrance on the lower level, but since the floors were at slightly different elevations, that entrance features the shortest escalator in North America, at a height of six steps.
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