Kite Realty gives new life to 65-year-old Nora Plaza

In a way, Max Pauker grew up in Nora Plaza.

He was a 5-year-old when his grandfather Milton Fetter opened Bagel Fair in 1975 at the shopping center on East 86th Street west of North Central High School.

Pauker has vivid memories of scurrying across Nora Plaza’s parking lot to buy vinyl records at an Ayr-Way department store. That discount offshoot of L.S. Ayres closed and was replaced in 1980 by a Target, one in a series of retail evolutions at Nora Plaza.

In the most recent shakeup, Kite Realty Group Trust purchased most of the 170,000-square-foot shopping center (Target not included) for $29 million in 2019.

Five years later, Kite’s plans for Nora Plaza, 1340 E. 86th St., are coming into focus with an influx of eye-catching tenants. Home decor store West Elm and kitchenware specialist Williams Sonoma, a pair of chains owned by San Francisco-based Williams-Sonoma Inc., are migrating from the Fashion Mall at Keystone.

Luxury beauty retailer Bluemercury plans to make its Indiana debut this year with two shops, one at Nora Plaza and one at Clay Terrace in Carmel.

And two restaurants from Phoenix-based Fox Restaurant Concepts will enter the Indianapolis market with locations at Nora Plaza. American comfort food restaurant Culinary Dropout will occupy a 6,500-square-foot building presently under construction, and fast-casual restaurant Flower Child will open in a Nora Plaza outlot building shared with tenants such as Garbanzo Mediterranean Fresh and Bank of America.

Indianapolis-based Kite prepared for the new wave of tenants by investing in utilities, signage and infrastructure.

“It looks better than it ever has, and I’ve been looking at this place for my entire life,” Pauker said.

Bagel Fair, now owned by Pauker, moved within the shopping center at Kite’s request. Lakeshore Learning Store, part of a California-based chain, also shifted its location at Nora Plaza.

Five locally owned tenants—Artisano’s Oils & Spices, Athletic Annex, Nifty Nails, Nora Plaza Alterations and Nora Plaza Barber Shop—stayed put after Kite’s purchase.

Kite didn’t renew leases for other locally owned tenants, including Goodman’s Shoes and Global Gifts, and their controversial exits were documented in IBJ and by TV news outlets.

Spots north of Whole Foods Market at Nora Plaza once occupied by Goodman’s Shoes, Global Gifts, a location of The UPS Store and the former locations of Bagel Fair and Lakeshore Learning Store were renovated to make way for the West Elm, Williams Sonoma and Bluemercury stores.

Goodman’s Shoes and Global Gifts, as well as DL Lowry Salon and Midwest Jewelry & Coin Exchange, now serve customers in post-Nora Plaza settings ranging from nearby storefronts on 86th Street (Goodman’s and Lowry) to Westfield Boulevard just south of 86th Street (Global Gifts) to the southern border of Carmel on 96th Street (Midwest Jewelry).

Pauker said Bagel Fair was treated well by Kite, which allowed the bagel shop to operate at one location while the future location was being readied three doors to the north.

“We were only closed for one week,” Pauker said of January’s store relocation. “We didn’t know how it was going to work out, and it ended up with [Kite] really taking care of us.”

Staying active

The Culinary Dropout restaurant is expected to open during the first half of next year, according to Anita Walker, vice president of marketing for Fox Restaurant Concepts. An opening date for the 3,200-square-foot Flower Child restaurant is to be determined.

Known for presenting live music and offering games such as ping-pong, cornhole and foosball, Culinary Dropout features a tagline of “genuine food and drink.” For Flower Child, it’s “healthy food for a happy world.”

The Monon Trail, which borders Nora Plaza to the east and is accessible at Garbanzo Mediterranean Fresh, was a selling point when Fox Restaurant Concepts scouted the area, Walker said.

“Flower Child, specifically, caters to a very active lifestyle,” Walker said. “Guests who are active are important to us. They’re out and about and curious about new things. They don’t have a lot of desire to stay home.”

Fox Restaurant Concepts was founded by Sam Fox, a 10-time James Beard Award semifinalist. The Cheesecake Factory acquired Fox Restaurant Concepts for $308 million in 2019 and has accelerated expansion for brands such as Culinary Dropout and Flower Child.

Acknowledging that out-of-state restaurants routinely debut in Hamilton County’s Noblesville, Fishers and Carmel, Walker cited Kite as a proponent of Nora Plaza’s presence in Indianapolis proper.

“We have really great partners in the Nora Plaza project,” Walker said. “We could see the future. It just seems like the place where we’d want to make our entry into the market.”

Kite owns interests in 180 U.S. open-air shopping centers and mixed-use assets, making up more than 28 million square feet of leasable space.

“We are thrilled with the ongoing transformation at Nora Plaza and the opportunity to bring several first-to-market concepts to Indianapolis,” said Bryan McCarthy, Kite senior vice president of corporate marketing and communications, in a statement provided to IBJ.

In-person connections

Founded in Washington, D.C., in 1999, cosmetics company Bluemercury was acquired by Macy’s in 2015 and now shares a New York City headquarters with its parent.

Jenna Goldberg, Bluemercury’s head of stores, omnichannel and strategy, said online shopping hasn’t eclipsed in-person connections for her company.

“Brick-and-mortar locations have always been at the core of the Bluemercury business because service is a key tenet of what sets Bluemercury apart,” Goldberg said. “That hyper-personalized service starts in store with our beauty experts and the experiences they provide to our clients every day.”

In 2022, Equivis Realty owner Robyn Swihart told IBJ that Whole Foods and Target could serve as magnets when Kite sought tenants for Nora Plaza.

“Those are some of the most highly coveted co-tenants in the retail space, [which means] there may be national tenants that would like to locate near those anchors,” Swihart said.

“Bluemercury wants to be where its clients are going regularly,” Goldberg said.

West Elm completed its move from the Fashion Mall to Nora Plaza in May. A timeline for Williams Sonoma’s relocation has not been announced.

Shoppers have gathered at Nora Plaza for 65 years. When the shopping center opened in 1959, 86th Street was known as State Road 100. Nora Plaza’s original tenants included F.W. Woolworth Co., Kroger and Goodman’s Shoes.

Nora Plaza has had several owners through the years. Locally based PK Partners bought the entire shopping center in 2004, invested some $2 million in improvements and, in 2007, sold most of it to a partnership between Michigan-based Ramco-Gershenson Properties Trust and Chicago-based Heilman LLC.

Valuable location

Although Pauker said he appreciates Kite’s efforts to upgrade the appearance of Nora Plaza, the Bagel Fair owner said the shopping center’s location is its top asset.

“Our customers don’t seem to care what the shopping center looks like,” Pauker said with a laugh.

The Carmel resident who retired from the Fishers Fire Department in 2020 said people don’t shy away from this Indianapolis address that’s easy to reach from Interstate 465, the Meridian-Kessler neighborhood, Dean Road and his neighbors north of 96th.

According to Kite’s leasing brochure for Nora Plaza, the shopping center was the destination for 2.1 million total customer visits in 2023.

“This is a very established area, and a lot of people know what’s going on,” said Pauker, who took over the bagel shop after the 2020 death of Reyna Pauker—his mother and the daughter of Bagel Fair founder Milton Fetter.

During Max Pauker’s childhood, however, bagels weren’t a prevalent food item in central Indiana.

“I remember people not even knowing what they were,” he said.

Fetter grew up in New York City and brought what Pauker describes as an authentic method for making bagels to Indianapolis.

Pauker estimates that Bagel Fair endured a decade’s learning curve for Indianapolis residents to appreciate the bread rolls that are boiled before baking.

The original Nora Plaza shop lacked air-conditioning in its early years, Pauker said, which posed challenges when working with “finicky” dough. In recent years, the plumbing showed its age, Pauker said.

Kite razed the old location as part of Nora Plaza’s makeover.

With Bagel Fair’s 50th anniversary on deck in 2025, Pauker said he’s grateful for his new location about 50 feet north of where Fetter set up shop.

“This is about the best scenario for us,” he said. “The Bagel Fair is known for being in Nora Plaza. I value that Kite allowed that to continue.”•