Phipps Plaza — Attraction in Atlanta

Although I love visiting Phipps Plaza once a year to take my children to see Santa, I would never hang out here regularly, shop here regularly...Armani? Tiffany? Come on. This ain't a mall for "regular" folks.

The mall is truly gorgeous, a bastion to conspicuous consumption. It's well lit and spotlessly clean, with marble and mahogany accents, interesting architectural features like columns and curved staircases and abundant greenery.

The shops are upscale - designer fashions, handbags, jewelery and watches, not to mention high end electronics and all the home goods you could desire to make your house Pinterest perfect, or Architectural Digest perfect if that's more your style.

I have been coming to Phipps since I was a kid. As a child, it was to visit their beautiful Santa In college, I frequented the AMC movie theater.

Now I have kids of my own and happily live OTP. Each year in July I faithfully make my pre-registration to see Santa. It is so worth it y'all. Their Santa a beautiful, kind, just an all around stellar guy who makes your kids feel special. Also special is NOT having to stand in a mall Santa line with all manner of humanity for hours to get a five minute visit Santa. When you register to see the Phipp's Santa, you get a set time and date for your visit. The longest we've waited once we arrived is 20 minutes.

We drive in while my husband clings, white knuckled, to the steering wheel, gazing in horror at the insane traffic around us at the Lennox/Phipps exit.

We park at the Phipps Parking deck. It's free and there are always plenty of spots available - thank you Phipps folks!

We head inside for a stop at Starbucks, always staffed by a rotating crew of college kids who know - and care - way more about coffee than we ever will. We take a seat at one of their tables located right in the middle of a mall corridor for some fascinating people watching.

Hipster dudes with laser-cut beards and roll-cuffed jeans.

The teenage children of the Atlanta elite out in small packs, girls already looking infinitely bored at 16, swinging shiny boutique bags, sporting handbags that cost more than I made in the first quarter of 2018.

Their boyfriends follow a few steps behind, athletic and overwarm in puffer vests looking a little lost.

Wealthy matrons with impeccable coifs and chunky statement jewelery, undoubtedly with real stones, unlike mine that came from eBay.

A few families that wandered away from the welcoming chaos of the Legoland at the other side of the mall and found themselves lost in the jungle of conspicuous consumption at its finest.

Some antivax moms, smelling deliciously of essential oils and old money and laughing delightedly as their free range children climb the indoor landscape features. Don't you just love Tiernan's curious nature?

And finally, some aggressively ITP couples, smelling of new money and expensive aftershave, looking for just the right luxury watch that screams "I make six figures!" but in an understated way, but that people will still notice and be impressed.

I kid, but only a little. Would it be great to have the kind of cash required for a day of shopping at Phipps, YES indeed. Will it happen to me if we don't win the Fantasy Five? Nope. So for now, all I have is snark and student loan debt. (The people watching really is fabulous though!)

We visit Santa, in and out in under 20 minutes, (Did I mention this year we went as Jurassic Park characters?!) then snap a few selfies under the Christmas trees behind the huge curved staircases.

I take a peek in the Tiffany holiday miniature display windows, they are so well done, and then we leave.

The few times we wandered into stores were more uncomfortable than anything as pretentious store clerks noticed the distinct lack of the green glow of money around us and bustled over to ask incredulously if we needed help.

Back in our car, it's honestly a relief to head north and grab a big dinner...

Ahh Phipps! Where do I begin with you? I’ve watched countless movies at the amc, gotten my caffeine on during the late night and early early morning shopping I come do half asleep as I empty my bank account! 😂😂😂 Phipps is the high end designer mall. Has everything from Gucci, Versace, Tiffany, emporio, you name it! Well, let me say that now thatAtlanta has buckhead shops, I guess I truly can’t say it’s the top high end designer brand mall, but it somewhat it because it still had Nordstrom and saks! It also has LEGO land! So there’s a lot of things to do here! Plus the restaurants here are amazing! They are opening nobu! There’s a great South African restaurant here too! The food court is okay. Definitely not that great and lacks options and very limited! However if you want a nice sit down dinner or lunch the options are great!

I come here to shop often and I highly recommend shopping here! You can tell your husband to take the kids to LEGO land as you shop or even let them watch a movie as you shop!

It’s pretty convenient if you ask me!

Parking is easy! Valet is also an option! the parking deck is pretty convenient too! Plus, if you don’t find what you are looking for here, then walk across the street to Lenox mall and you’ll definitely be sure to find something between the two amazing malls! They won’t disappoint! Now if you find something and can’t afford it, you can fault the mall...

Very upsacle shopping center. Amazing.

Check out what I bought, follow me on google review. Make sure to buy the exact things I swear it's better than Balenciaga. ithink.

20240926154141

Took off a star on review. I got blocked into the exclusive club upstairs into the lego center. Wanted to see what's inside, they told me I need to have a kid in order to enter. How that makes... really a lot of sense.

They do have an adult night as well as Saturn 5 for sale for less than 300 dollars. As well as Will Pharrell about the same price. I sometimes get mixed up with John Legend and Will.iam and Will Pharrell. I think the best artist is... uh..

Black Pink Kpop. I'm kidding please sponsor me, I ain't got money.

But I can translate, ithink. how much they pay for a translator when we have google. not sure. Hire me google.

Gracigos, this place is very upscale.

Wonder how they can make it upper scale. not sure. i might know. not sure. but maybe sure but still not sure. yet it does make sure it does. Trust the kiddos.

They know the trend. Follow the trend, you might end up in mars.

Elon said so. Sponsored my NASA partnered with SpaceX. Wonder what happened to the other space exploration corporate. Oh.. their doors fell off.

Time to fly. 2024...