The $20-million Mediterranean-style retail center is being built where a mobile home neighborhood used to stand.
By TERRI REEVES
Published March 19, 2004
LARGO - Developers are right on schedule in transforming what was once a sleepy mobile home neighborhood known as Silvercrest Manor into a $20-million Mediterranean-style hub for shoppers.
A Publix, a Home Depot, a Walgreens and a host of smaller stores will make up the new retail center at the northeast corner of Seminole Boulevard and Ulmerton Road.
"Everything is on time, and there haven't been any surprises," said Owen Ewing, vice president of Paradise Development Group in Safety Harbor. "The city of Largo has been very accommodating."
The center is about 90 percent leased with a Publix, Walgreens, Kinko's and specialty stores, which include a hair salon, sandwich shop, pizzeria, bank, nail salon, electronic game retailer and a cellular communications store.
About 5,600 square feet of retail space is still available.
Construction for the 137,000-square-foot Home Depot, which replaces an older, smaller version of the home improvement store, began last fall and is about 75 percent complete.
A 15,000-square-foot Walgreens, which will feature a drive-through window, began emerging in January and is about 35 percent complete. It will be accompanied by the Shoppes of Largo, a group of retail stores totaling about 12,000 square feet. Construction of these stores is expected to be complete by July or August.
Phase II, the Paradise Shoppes of Largo, will be anchored by a 45,000-square-foot Publix.
About 10,000 square feet of specialty stores will adjoin the grocery store, and that phase should be completed by March 2005.
The retail center will have a Mediterranean design in shades of harvest gold, colonial yellow and jade, Ewing said.
Coral tile stone will accent points on the columns and base of the buildings.
The Paradise Group, established in 1988, has built about 40 Publix-anchored shopping centers and 40 Walgreens drugstores, as well as other retail strip locations throughout the southeastern United States.
