Anthropologie is preparing to open a new store at The Shops on Lane Avenue in Upper Arlington, bringing the national lifestyle retailer's mix of apparel, home décor, and accessories to the western Columbus suburb for the first time. The roughly 9,000-square-foot store will also include a full Anthropologie Weddings section, giving local shoppers a bridal destination they previously had to travel across town to find.
The planned store was first reported by WhatNow Columbus, which noted that the location is expected to open in late spring 2027, though Anthropologie has not announced an exact date. The retailer told the outlet it would share additional details closer to the opening, and it did not respond to WhatNow's request for further information about the build-out. Founded in 1992 in Wayne, Pennsylvania, Anthropologie has grown from a single boutique into a global lifestyle retailer with more than 200 stores, offering everything from furniture and beauty products to shoes and gifts.
A Bridal Shop Joins the Everyday Lineup
The Upper Arlington store will serve everyday lifestyle shoppers alongside customers seeking wedding-related apparel and accessories, per the store's planned layout. Anthropologie Weddings works with a range of designers and brands, carrying bridal gowns, bridesmaids' dresses, party dresses, and wedding décor at different styles and price points, according to the same report. That bridal division traces back to 2011, when parent company URBN launched it as a standalone line called BHLDN before folding it into the Anthropologie name to draw on the core brand's recognition, as Apartment Therapy has detailed.
As of this month, Anthropologie's only other Central Ohio location sits at Easton Town Center's The Strand on the northeast side of Columbus, meaning the Upper Arlington store will give western-suburb shoppers their first chance to browse a physical location without crossing town. Anthropologie is part of URBN, whose portfolio also includes Urban Outfitters, Free People, FP Movement, and Terrain. The parent company posted record fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 net sales of $1.80 billion for the quarter ended January 31, 2026, with Anthropologie's retail segment comparable sales climbing 3.7%, according to Urban Outfitters, Inc. URBN's fiscal 2025 SEC filing outlined plans to open roughly 15 new Anthropologie stores globally while closing two, with new stores averaging about 7,500 square feet — making the Upper Arlington location somewhat larger than the brand's typical footprint.
Why Upper Arlington, and Why Now
Upper Arlington posted a median household income of $155,167 in 2024 dollars, nearly double Ohio's statewide median, according to U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey data. The suburb of roughly 36,000 residents sits close to Ohio State University and combines high homeownership rates with substantial disposable income, a profile that has increasingly drawn premium lifestyle and bridal retailers to its commercial corridors.
The Shops on Lane Avenue itself is a 176,983-square-foot open-air center owned and managed by Kimco Realty, anchored by Whole Foods Market, Ulta Beauty, and COhatch. Kimco reporting cited by Crexi indicates the center's Whole Foods location ranks fourth in foot traffic among all Whole Foods stores in Ohio. The property traces back to 1949, when it opened as the Lane Avenue Shopping Center — Upper Arlington's first shopping center and, at the time, its largest — before converting into an enclosed mall in the 1970s and later returning to an open-air layout in 2006, according to the City of Upper Arlington. Early tenants once included Big Bear grocery and McKinley's Drugstore, a far cry from today's national upscale brands.
Anthropologie's arrival adds to a wave of tenant turnover at the center. Columbus Business First reported that Italian pizza concept Piccolo Buco by Cooper's Hawk is also opening at The Shops on Lane Avenue, marking the Rome-inspired concept's first Ohio location — a story Hoodline covered in Trevi Fountain pizza's Ohio debut. That follows another recent addition to the Lane Avenue corridor, detailed in Hoodline's report on Fox in the Snow's new café.
A Corridor Built for Foot Traffic
The Shops on Lane Avenue sits about two miles west of Ohio State's main campus and serves a combined daytime population of nearly 300,000 within a five-mile radius, according to Kimco Realty. That trade area draws heavily from university faculty, students, medical staff, and nearby affluent neighborhoods. Surrounding redevelopment led by Crawford Hoying has added more than 240 residential units, two hotels, and ground-floor dining directly across from the shopping center, with projects like Westmont at The Lane built in partnership with the City of Upper Arlington to turn the corridor into a walkable destination.
Anthropologie's Upper Arlington debut isn't an isolated move. The brand has recently expanded into other neighborhood and suburban retail settings, including a Nashville shopping block and a mixed-use development in Decatur, signaling that URBN sees this kind of dense, high-income trade area as fertile ground for new stores. For now, shoppers in Upper Arlington will have to wait until late spring 2027 for the doors to open, with Anthropologie promising more specifics as that date approaches.
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