The parts of the store that were left alone, however, still have a very familiar look -- just one that I'm not used to seeing combined with Lifestyle v2! It's particularly strange seeing the original wall tile left in place -- while Safeway's Seattle Division likes to leave old wall tile when they remodel their own stores, all of the converted Albertsons I've visited did receive either Lifestyle or Modern tile. Sadly, the Grocery Palace floor tile wasn't kept, but at least they installed nice beige vinyl instead of going with either cheap white vinyl or polished concrete, like they do these days.
Lifestyle v2 looks pretty good here, as it does in most places, and I'm certainly glad Safeway decided to put in real floor covering here! That said, oaf, I'm really glad that the two former Grocery Palaces I shop at most regularly here in Houston, one Krogertsons and one Randalbertsons, both had drop ceilings installed because this looks really bad here! In fact, it might be worthwhile to compare this store to the Randalbertsons which Mike and I did a post about at HHR last year: https://houstonhistoricretail.com/2023/08/09/randalbertsons-its-your-boomerang-albertsons-store-because-the-locals-rejected-food-lion/
ReplyDeleteI know the drop ceiling, the HVAC ducts most specifically, at that Randalbertsons is a bit goofy, but this corner at the Randalbertsons looks a lot, lot better than how it looks here, IMO. The deli area at our Randalbertsons also has the Lifestyle fake wood in this corner as opposed to the standard floor which looks a bit better. And, also, the Randalbertsons did replace the Albertsons wall tile (though the Albertsons wall tile lives on in the bathrooms at least).
I'll go ahead and put this here, but as you can see in the Randalbertsons post, that Albertsons also had/has the glass bricks on the front wall. That was a common feature of Albertsons in Texas. I was a bit surprised when either you or AFB (AFB I think) said that the glass bricks were strange and weren't common in stores in your/AFB's area. If that is a strange Albertsons feature in your area, well, I guess the Hagway isn't the only Albertsons property in this corner which has a Texas design which is unusual in the Northwest!
I reckon that in many ways, this store will end up looking more like the Lifestyle v3 Safertsons I saw in Troutdale last year than the Randalbertsons even though the Randalbertsons has Lifestyle v2!
I think you're going to change your opinion on this store's implementation of Lifestyle v2 pretty quick...
DeleteYou probably won't be surprised to hear that I don't really mind the open ceiling at this store. I definitely prefer it over the weird drop ceiling with exposed ducts that your store has!
The old Grocery Palace wall tile pattern doesn't look that bad with the Lifestyle v2 color scheme, since they both have some maroon coloring in them.
ReplyDeleteThat is true -- it's just a strange sight!
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