THE LAST DAYS (Maybe) OF A DALLAS LANDMARK

The Neiman Marcus flagship was rescued from closing in a last-minute, perhaps temporary deal. A Texas native describes the parties, fashion shows, art openings, and unforgettable meals that made the nine-story crenellated confection much more than just a store.

- BY JAMES MCAULEY

Long ago and far away, there was a store. The Store, as it was known then, and still is, at least among those of us lucky enough to have grown up in and around it. It was ours, it was magic, and soon it will be gone.

At the corner of Main Street and Ervay in downtown Dallas, Neiman Marcus rose like a crenellated confection, nine stories of retail romance and aesthetic allure. Having occupied that site since 1914, the Store survived no shortage of challenges in the years since then—among them the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November 1963, a few blocks away; a crippling fire in December 1964, days before Christmas; and, beginning in 1969, a slew of different owners who expanded the brand to national and then global prominence before, in recent years, whittling it down to a shadow of its former self. Never has that shadow seemed smaller.

Saks Global, the current parent company of Neiman Marcus (and of Saks Fifth Avenue), made headlines earlier this year when it decreed the closure of the iconic downtown Dallas store, the capital of a retail empire that once seemed invincible, a synonym for postwar American elegance, with outposts from Coral Gables to Beverly Hills. But to Dallasites, this was a blow that struck at the heart. There is no question that Neiman Marcus was the best of us—and not just Neiman Marcus the concept or Neiman Marcus the brand, which will continue, but Neiman Marcus the original, literal store, with its marble, its carpets, and, most of all, its history. It is impossible to conceive of Dallas without it.