• The Wall Street Journal , Thursday, July 17, 2008 10:15 AM

Lifestyle Centers -- open-air shopping venues that offer small parks, fountains and cafés amid name-brand retailers -- have been all the rage this decade. But the slumping economy is forcing the chi-chi retailers who flocked to them to cancel expansion plans and even shut stores.

Last year, developers built 37 centers amounting to roughly 40% of the total lifestyle-center square footage added this decade, according to market-research firm Portfolio & Property Research Inc. Double that total is now under construction, and three times as much is in the planning stages. But the economic slowdown means many of the planned projects won't leave the drawing board. And many centers under construction will probably have difficulty leasing space when they open.

Some believe that the lifestyle-center craze was about to run its course in any case. The metropolitan locations that are best suited to the centers are mostly taken. Certainly the centers being built now show an evolution in the approach to the centers. Recent versions have larger formats and more diverse tenant rosters, including department stores and movie theaters.

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