Prominent East Memphis site's demolition timeline revealed

By Dima Amro – Memphis Business Journal

June 24, 2026

After the Macy's building at Oak Court Mall came down earlier this year, work on the rest of the East Memphis property has begun.

Josh Poag, the leader of the group of Memphians who bought the mall in 2023 for $14 million, said interior demolition of the 850,000-square-foot Oak Court Mall began in May, and he expects to complete the razing by early 2027.

"We had the remaining tenants leave in April," Poag told MBJ. "That was the last step to making sure that we can move forward with the demolition of the mall itself."

The 300,000-square-foot Macy's store once stood at 4545 Poplar Ave., where a pile of broken concrete and rubble now sits behind a metal fence after the $1.7 million demolition. Macy's announced in January 2025 its plans to close the Oak Court Mall location along with 65 other stores.

The rest of the Oak Court Mall closed in April and is now behind yellow tape — facing the wrecking ball.

Poag said it is unclear on the specific timeframe when the building will come down, but the crews are currently removing items left by tenants, lighting, and ceiling panels. Grinder, Taber & Grinder is the general contractor for the project.

"We're still working through ideas and planning," Poag said. "Development takes a long time; it's an extremely complicated process."

Only two buildings by Oak Court Mall will remain open and standing: the Oak Court Office Building and Dillard's, which is owned by the department store chain.

Oak Court Partners LLC, the mall's ownership group, filed planned development documents in 2025 that offered a glimpse into the land's future. A large-scale mixed-use development is set to be built on the site, transforming the former mall's parcels into a dense walkable neighborhood in the heart of East Memphis.

That filing showed that Oak Court Partners plans to develop the site into a hub of activity and an East Memphis anchor, with the possibility of multifamily units, retail, hotels, clinics, and arts centers.

Poag said the development team is still in the design phase of the project, and he is not sure when they will begin vertical construction.

LRK, the architecture firm behind the Water Tower District at Schilling Farms, Harbor Town, and Orleans Station, is leading the design of the process and has shown the development group some possibilities.

"That was just the preliminary [design], so we could start seeing how we get our arms around if we were to do more multifamily [or] if we did more retail, what it would look like," Poag said. "Those haven't progressed at all, but that's where we are — just navigating the markets and trying to figure out what our vision is."