Published May 31, 2026
Sunvalley Mall generated an unusual number of postcards during its early years, capturing the futuristic architecture, dramatic interiors, fountains, sculptures, and public spaces that made the Concord shopping center a destination in its own right. These cards offer a visual record of the mall during those years—and, occasionally, a glimpse into how visitors experienced it.
The Great Hall was one of the spaces most often photographed. Soaring ceilings, terrazzo floors, distinctive lighting, and commissioned artwork gave the interior an atmosphere unlike a conventional shopping center.
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| Postcard showing Sunvalley Mall’s Great Hall, with the gold-capped information booth, dandelion-inspired light fixtures, and a mother and child crossing the terrazzo floor in a Baza'r shopping cart. |
The image captures the scale and theatrical design of the Great Hall, but the handwritten message on the back adds something a photograph cannot: a visitor’s own impression of the experience. The writer tells Mary, “we should do this shopping center together some day,” adding that after spending three hours there, they had “hardly scratched the surface.”
For a shopping center designed to make a visit feel like an event, it is an unusually fitting souvenir.
The exterior postcards also captured the experience of arriving at Sunvalley by car. One view looks across the parking lot toward JCPenney and Macy's, with rows of cars filling the foreground.
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| Postcard showing Sunvalley Mall’s vast parking lot—JCPenney anchors the foreground, Macy’s looms behind, and a fleet of late ’60s and early ’70s cars stands ready for a day of shopping. |
The back of this card boasts parking for 9,000 cars, including 16 acres of covered parking. The photograph itself is almost as interesting for the cars it captures—wood-paneled station wagons, oversized sedans, and gleaming chrome bumpers filling the lot.
Looking closely, the mall cinema is visible near Bank of America, a small detail that hints at how much more than shopping Sunvalley offered its visitors.
Another postcard offers a wider view of the Great Hall, extending all the way toward Sears. The space-age lighting and Janet Bennett's murals are clearly visible.
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| A later postcard showing a wider view of Sunvalley's Great Hall, with the space-age lighting and Janet Bennett's murals visible along the upper walls. |
Though the stores have changed over the decades, the architecture and artwork remain remarkably recognizable, preserving the distinctly futuristic atmosphere of the mall's early years.
The most memorable feature of the Great Hall near Macy's may have been the massive kinetic sculpture known as "Dills and Dandelions," created by John Augsburger.
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| Postcard of John Augsburger's “Dills and Dandelions” sculpture rising from the center of the lower-level fountain at Sunvalley Mall, with Macy's visible beyond. |
Fiberglass flowers rose forty feet from the lower-level fountain, extending through an opening into the Great Hall above. Hidden fans caused the stems and blossoms to sway gently, while oversized metal insects clung to the flowers. The postcard description enthusiastically describes the installation's "Brobdingnagian atmosphere"—a word meaning extraordinarily large.
For many local children, the fountain beneath the sculpture became a destination of its own. Coins glittered beneath the water, and wishes were made one penny at a time.
The postcards also documented an aspect of Sunvalley's design that is easy to forget today: much of the mall's second level was built above a partially underground lower floor.
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| Postcard showing a view of the upper level of Sunvalley’s center court, where escalators rise from the shadowy lower floor. |
This view looks across the center court toward the escalators connecting the two levels, with B. Dalton Bookseller visible in the background. Among local kids, the lower level would later earn a nickname: “the dungeon.”
Another postcard focuses on the JCPenney Court, with its distinctive escalators and classic blue “Penney's” logo.
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| Postcard of the JCPenney Court and its signature escalators, photographed during the 1970s. |
The lower level in this area once contained a food court that has largely faded from memory. Photographs of it are surprisingly difficult to find today, making postcards like these especially valuable records of the mall's changing interior.
Sunvalley's public art extended beyond fountains and kinetic sculptures. One of the more unusual installations was "Rooster and Hens" by Bezalel Mann, located in the Great Hall near JCPenney.
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| Postcard of the "Rooster and Hens" sculpture by Bezalel Mann, located near JCPenney and partially obscured in the dim lighting of this early photo. |
In this early postcard, the sculptures are difficult to make out, hidden in the shadows above the corridor.
A later photograph, aided by flash photography, reveals the work more clearly.
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| A later postcard reveals "Rooster and Hens" more clearly, highlighting one of Sunvalley's most distinctive public artworks. |
The difference between the two postcards is striking: in the earlier image, the sculptures nearly disappear into the shadows; in the later one, they become a prominent feature of the hall.
The Great Hall near Sears featured its own sculpture: "4 and 20 Blackbirds" by Joseph Anthony McDonnell. The bronze work stood on the second level near Sears, across from Walgreens.
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| Postcard of the Great Hall near Sears in the 1970s, featuring Joseph Anthony McDonnell's "4 and 20 Blackbirds" sculpture on the upper level near Sears, with Walgreens visible. |
The postcard preserves the sculpture as part of the upper-level landscape near Sears and Walgreens.
Most of what these postcards depict is gone. The fountains were removed, the kinetic flowers stopped swaying, and Sunvalley's original public art disappeared during later renovations. The postcards remain as small records of a mall that was designed to make shopping feel like an event—and that, for a time, looked very much like the future.
Collection
Shopping centers that shaped retail history across Alameda and Contra Costa counties from the 1950s through today.
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