Burke Williams to Close Day Spa at San Francisco Centre

The San Francisco Centre mall is one fewer luxury store closer to turning out the lights.

The Inglewood-based Burke Williams Day Spa announced it will be draining its pools on the fifth floor of the beleaguered mall at 865 Market Street, near Union Square, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. It’s slated to close on April 28.

The news comes a few weeks after Bloomingdale’s said it would be shutting the doors of its 339,000-square-foot flagship store at the more than half-empty mall.

Burke Williams, known for its relaxing pools and facials and massages that start at $140, moved into its 16,000-square-foot storefront in 2006, becoming the city’s largest day spa.

Bill Armour, president of the company, told customers in a message Wednesday that the “difficult decision” to close wasn’t because of its financial health.

It’s a “direct result of the city’s failure to address the deterioration of safety” and “overall” Downtown conditions, he said.

Armour said the spa has in recent years suffered a “precipitous decline in business.”

The reason, he said: “myriad of decisions” made by San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, mayor and “government infrastructure,” which have compromised public safety in downtown San Francisco.

As a result, he said, the mall’s anchor tenants, including Bloomingdale’s and Nordstrom, were “forced out.”

Nordstrom closed its 312,000-square-foot flagship store in 2023 after 35 years at the mall, citing public safety concerns.

Then Cinemark’s 52,000-square-foot Century 9 movie house, across from Burke Williams, turned off its projectors.

Other tenants to close up shop include Adidas, J. Crew, Hollister and American Eagle. Bloomingdale’s will go dark in March.

The 1.5 million-square-foot mall was once owned by Brookfield Properties, based in New York, and Westfield, a unit of Paris-based Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield. Last year, they walked away from the property after ceasing payments on a $558 million loan.

The mall has since been run by Trident Pacific, a court-appointed receiver charged with leasing it up for a future sale. By early last year, the mall had lost an estimated $1 billion in value.

— Dana Bartholomew