The Delco Store is back at 1991 Sproul Road, now in a new space next to Five Guys. A few doors away, Rize Pizza's new glass storefront looks into a dining room that didn't exist last spring. Plato's Closet, which used to sit at 1911 Sproul Road, now shares a wall with Dollar Tree.

That makes three moves at Lawrence Park Shopping Center in one year, and all three ended up back on the property. If you run errands here every week, the map in your head is out of date. The bigger story is how familiar this is. Since its anchor department store closed in 1977, Lawrence Park has dealt with change by cutting up and handing out space it already had. This fall's moves are the newest example.

Three Moves, One Parking Lot

Here's where things stand heading into November 2026.

The Delco Store took the longest route back. Delco Today reported that founders Erik Schmidt and Lara Lewis opened it as a seasonal pop-up at Springfield Mall during the 2020 holiday season. Its first permanent home was Lawrence Park. While its new space was being built, the shop ran out of the former Party City in Springfield, and Patch noted that the temporary spot was large. It still came back to Sproul Road. The stock hasn't changed: Delco shirts and county-branded gifts next to hats and gear for the Eagles, Flyers, Phillies and 76ers.

Plato's Closet made the shortest move. Patch reported in July that the store would close on a Saturday and planned to reopen in its bigger space the following Tuesday or Wednesday.

Rize Is Building Its First Dining Room

Of the three moves, Rize's changes the most about how people use the place.

The pizzeria closed in April to remodel its original space and expand into the storefront next door. Delco Today's September update said the work ran longer than planned, then picked up over the summer once McGonigle & Company Builders took over as contractor. The added space will give Rize full-service dining for the first time. Until now, it was known mainly for takeout. The original side stays focused on takeout, and the new side becomes a sit-down restaurant.

Takeout resumed September 2, and patio seating opened along with it. As of Delco Today's mid-September update, crews were finishing the dining room and no opening date had been set. Rize has been posting progress on its social channels, and that's the place to check before you plan a sit-down dinner.

During construction, the business posted on Facebook, quoted by Delco Today:

"We are working hard to get Rize reopened for you, bigger and better than ever!"

The menu that built Rize's following is the same: the square "Rize Crust" with sesame seeds baked onto the bottom, plus round pies and gluten-free cauliflower crusts. Specialty pizzas include the Upside Down, Angry Bird, Southern Belle, Green Dream, Venus and Rib Eye Cheesesteak. What's new is the option to stay and eat inside, at a center where most food stops have been built around getting in and out quickly.

The Building That Was Planned for a Third Floor

To see why Lawrence Park tends to reshuffle instead of emptying out, go back to the building at its center.

On November 2, 1959, Snellenburg's announced its fifth store at Food Fair Properties' Lawrence Park Shopping Center, according to Marple History's account of the store. The plan called for 100,000 square feet on two floors, another 50,000 square feet for up to nine more tenants, and parking for 2,500 cars. The architects, Thalheimer & Weitz, designed it so a third level of 50,000 square feet could go on top if demand called for it.

Ground broke the week before Thanksgiving 1959 on a $1.5 million store. The Marple-Newtown High School band played, and Scouts helped bury a time capsule. The grand opening followed on August 31, 1960. In April 1961, Snellenburg's opened a drive-in tire center in a building behind the store. By 2020 that building held Popeye's and Saladworks. That was one of the first times a Lawrence Park building got a new use.

Lit Brothers bought Snellenburg's branch stores in 1962. In the early 1970s it added a two-level, 50,000-square-foot wing to the northeast side and advertised the location as the "Twice-As-Big Lawrence Park store." The store grew outward with a new wing, not up with the third level the original design had allowed for.

1977, When the Anchor Closed

In April 1977, City Stores announced it was closing all 11 Lit's stores in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The center's owner at the time, Amterre Development, went to court. As Marple History lays out, Amterre argued that Lit's had agreed to stay open until 1991, that Lit's was the center's only anchor, and that other tenants likely wouldn't renew if it closed. A Delaware County judge ordered the store to stay open, but in early May the two sides settled and Lit's was allowed to close.

The owner's worry made sense: when the anchor goes, the smaller stores often follow. That's not what happened. No single tenant took the old department store. The next owner, Federal Realty Investment Trust, split it into at least three stores. Over the next few decades the building filled like this:

1. November 1979. Best Products, a catalog showroom, opened on the upper level.
2. October 1981. Rickel Home Center opened in the lower rear.
3. Mid-1990s. After both closed, medical offices and a CHI Institute career school moved in.
4. By the 2000s. The only part of the old core still used for retail was the lower floor of the 1970s Lit's wing, now home to Dollar Tree.

That Dollar Tree is the store Plato's Closet now sits next to. This summer's move put one of the newest storefront arrangements at Lawrence Park beside the last retail piece of the 1960 department store.

Splitting Space Is How the Center Works

Federal Realty has run the property the same way since then. Its most recent large project started in 2019, and the reinvestment plan was completed in 2022, according to WhatNow Philadelphia. The new leases included Honeygrow, J.Crew and P.J. Whelihan's. Patch's 2022 coverage put the cost at $30 million and described added retail space, changes to traffic flow, and new outdoor dining and gathering areas. In March 2024, Patch reported that Sephora had signed for a 5,127-square-foot space, and WhatNow called it the last tenant needed to stabilize the redevelopment.

Federal Realty's current tenant roster reflects that approach. Acme Markets is the largest space at 53,357 square feet. Next come two Lankenau Medical Center spaces of 46,680 and 39,105 square feet, then HomeGoods at 27,700 and TJ Maxx at 19,600. Below those, the list is mostly smaller, everyday stops: Barnes & Noble, Fine Wine & Good Spirits, CVS, Kids First Swim School, Norman's Hallmark, Mrs. Marty's Deli, Flynn and O'Hara Uniforms, Lawrence Park Cleaners, Crumbl Cookies, Starbucks and Kumon. With dozens of mid-size and small spaces, one tenant growing or moving changes a few doors, not the whole center.

That's how this year's moves played out. Rize grew into the storefront next to it instead of moving away. The Delco Store had a larger temporary space in Springfield and still came back to a newly built space on Sproul Road. Plato's Closet found more room without leaving the parking lot. None of these moves came from a center-wide renovation. Each business made its own change inside a property built to absorb them.

The 1959 plan saved room for a third floor. When Lit's needed more space, it added a wing instead, and ever since the center has kept finding space within its existing footprint, and in 2026 that meant a new dining room for Rize and new storefronts for The Delco Store and Plato's Closet.

Want to know what's moving into a Broomall storefront, or what an empty space at Lawrence Park might become? Ask Worthington and get a fast, local answer from someone who follows Sproul Road one store at a time.