This shopping center began construction in September 1993 as the Northwest Freeway Center (though it was never referred to as such), a $10.5 million 247,000 square foot shopping center developed by Smith & Co. with Tom Moughon of Resource Development Group. The land (18 acres) was acquired that same year from Vickers Trust. The main anchors, a 104,800 square foot Venture discount department store and a 51,252 square foot Service Merchandise store were to open in July 1994. By 1995, a second phase was built facing Northwest Freeway but with 43rd Street addresses, anchored by Toys R Us. All of the anchors have changed hands at least once, and the roadside signage was replaced when the highway widened (it was originally with reddish brick like the center).
This page serves as a companion to the Northwest Freeway - Inner Belt and West Crosstimbers Street / West 43rd Street / Clay Road pages on Carbon-izer, and both link here.
It wasn't really the fact that all the anchors went out of business in short order in the late 1990s and early 2000s, or even the widening of the freeway that did the most damage to Northwest Freeway Center, it was the opening of Brookhollow Marketplace at Dacoma Street.
If we start at West 43rd Street and work our way around, the first thing is a Papa John's Pizza at 6455 West 43rd Street. This dates back to 1995, meaning it has been here all this time, through thick and thin. 6453 West 43rd was "Hair by Tiffany" as of 2007 and became Hair Clips in the late 2010s before closing in 2023 or 2024. Xtra 1.45 Cleaners at 6151 West 43rd Street's facade simply reads "1.45 Cleaners" as it has since 2007.
6445 West 43rd Street at the corner is Clinica Hispana Omega Care and reuses part of 6439 West 43rd Street, which was a larger restaurant space. The restaurant space was "The Original Pasta Company" (part of a chain from approx. 1994 to 2003), then Forno's of Italy (2003 to approx. 2013, tax records indicate that it simply disconnected from the chain), then LA Crawfish from 2014 to 2024. It was already closed in June 2024 despite Google Gemini insisting that it's still open.
6433 West 43rd Street was originally Toys R Us (#7042) from 1994 to 2005, with Fallas Paredes taking up residence in 2007. This store closed in the 2018 bankruptcy of the company. Fallas Paredes used the rainbow facade (the tiles), but its replacement, Rainbow Stores, did not. Rainbow replaced Fallas Paredes not long after it went under, and was still operating in October 2024, but by January 2026 had vacated the premises.
Continuing to west there's Northwest Beauty Supply (here since at least 2022 and still here in January 2026, this was The Avenue from 2012 to 2019, from 1994 to 2012 this was Sizes Unlimited. 6425 is Q Tee Nails (since at least 2016). 6421 is The Smile Club (dentists, though it more replaced Dino Dental, which was here at least in the late 2010s). 6417 has been Leslie's Pool Supplies since 2001, and that wraps it up for the West 43rd Street addresses.
12009 Northwest Freeway was originally Service Merchandise and closed in early 2002 when the chain finally went bankrupt, but it sat vacant for close to a decade. In 2011 it became a Joe V's Smart Shop, a discount grocery format for H-E-B. This is kind of an interesting choice. Joe V's is a bit disliked as a format as it goes into low-end neighborhoods where H-E-B doesn't want to build full-line stores (even C-grade H-E-B stores), namely areas where H-E-B had promised they'd build 10+ years ago, but didn't (a store on the Southwest Beltway is an example of this). This Joe V's is the first of its kind to wedge itself into a strip mall. I'm pretty sure confidence that they were not planning on an H-E-B here originally. When Joe V's opened in 2011 opened, the facade was red but around 2018 was painted brown. The Service Merchandise facade was much more interesting and looked like a real department store, with a brick entrance and a red arch over the entrance (presumably glowing red at night). This I don't have a ready picture of, but you can see it on the older Google Street Views and similar Service Merchandise facades.
Directly next to Service Merchandise was originally Venture #135 at 12005 Northwest Freeway and opened in July 1994. The store was never successful and closed in 1997 when it was sold to Kmart, reopening within a few months as Big Kmart #3878, closing their store at West 34th Street. It closed in January 2003. It was unprofitable when Venture sold it to Kmart, and Kmart wasn't able to turn it around. In 2005 it was reopened as Burlington Coat Factory, which featured departments like Baby Depot and eventually rebranded as Burlington around late 2017 or early 2018 before fleeing in 2020 for Brookhollow Marketplace. Even before Burlington moved to the smaller store as per their current model, the 105,000 square feet store was too much for the clothing store, and leased some space to a store called Affordable Furniture, which opened in 2008 (I'm not sure if Burlington tried to use the 100,000+ square foot space initially). After Burlington packed up in 2020 for Brookhollow Marketplace, Crazy Boss, a similar store, moved in to the space in 2023.
Continuing around counterclockwise and now facing Northwest Freeway, Petco #469 (12017 Northwest Freeway) was a tenant since 1995. It did replace the upper-case logo with the newer lower-case one by 2016, and stayed after Burlington left, but it too left in late 2023 for Brookhollow Marketplace. While the mascots, Red Ruff and Blue Mews, were part of the new sign (they weren't standard after the 2020 logo refresh), they weren't colored in the Brookhollow Marketplace store (that store opened with the "The Health + Wellness Co." logo, during a time when Petco only carried all-natural products and stopped carrying popular brands of pet food).
There isn't much of the shopping center after that. 12025 is currently vacant and has been vacant since Starbucks moved out of it during the redevelopment of the center in 2015. The original Starbucks Coffee was in a strip center with no drive-through and opened in 2001 (there's a few pictures on StarbucksEverywhere, note the reflection of Toys R Us).
Most of the shopping center was demolished at this point. The current Starbucks opened in 2016 at 12035 Northwest Freeway. It also added a drive-through in some of the space. Previously, this was 12037 Northwest Freeway, home of Old Towne Kolaches (which dated back to 1995 and closed in 2015, did not reopen).
Next, at 12041 Northwest Freeway, was Red Onion Seafood y Mas. It was a sister restaurant to the now-defunct Cafe Red Onion, and part of the same restaurant group.
Next, at 12043 Northwest Freeway, was originally Blimpie (1995-2003). In 2004, it became Red Onion Seafood y Mas with a new address (12041). It was a sister restaurant to the now-defunct Cafe Red Onion, and part of the same restaurant group. Both Cafe Red Onion and the Red Onion restaurant group were on Northwest Freeway (see the aforementioned Northwest Freeway link).
At the end was C&S Chinese Cafe (12047 Northwest Fwy.) operated from 1995 to 2013 in some form or another.
Last but not least, the Chase Bank was built at 12017 Northwest Freeway was built in 2006. This replaced another building, but I'm having trouble finding what it replaced.
That about wraps it up! Below are some additional pictures I took in 2018...
UPDATE 07-08-2026: After its initial posting in 2014 and major update in 2018, this has been fully updated to integrate both with the Northwest Freeway pages and West Crosstimbers Street/West 43rd Street/Clay Road pages.
