What does the future of malls look like in the GTA?

At a panel celebrating Yorkdale's 60th anniversary outside the mall's soon-to-be-built Simon's department store, Holt Renfrew CEO Sebastian Picardo marvelled at the mall's breadth of offerings, reminding the audience that it's place "you can buy lipstick and a car."

Picardo, Simon's CEO Bernard Leblanc and Harry Rosen President Ian Rosen came together Thursday before an audience to discuss Yorkdale's past, present and future.

The two-million-square-foot property opened in 1964 and has become the most successful mall in Canada, with annual sales of more than $2 billion, according to the shopping centre.

During the panel, they all acknowledged what you might expect: in a successful retail environment, the customer is king and quality products will keep them coming back.

But something else the panellists all agreed on was that, in the era of e-commerce where traditional brick and mortar businesses are competing with online giants, their best strategy for retailers is human connection.

"We actually consider community connection extremely strategic," Picardo said of his company. 

Retail analysts and business insiders say the role of retailers and malls is evolving.

"It's certainly no secret that malls as a class of retail have been having a really difficult time, and it's not recent," retail analyst Doug Stephens, the founder and CEO of Retail Prophet, told CBC Toronto.

Several malls in Toronto and the GTA have already started or are planning redevelopment and re-envisioning in an effort to satisfy the needs of 21st century customers.

"We're not in the commercial real estate business anymore," Stephens said.

Malls as neighbourhood anchors

Amid the housing crunch in Toronto, many shoppers need housing. 

Yorkdale's co-owner, Oxford Properties, has plans to turn the mall's parking lot into a new neighbourhood in the next two decades. 

City documents say the new neighbourhood will cover as much as 680,000 square metres, and include up to 1,500 residential units. 

Large-scale residential redevelopments are also planned for Scarborough Town Centre and Square One in Mississauga, where some completed buildings will open for occupancy in January, according to an email from Adrienne Simic, Yorkdale's media manager.

She said 35,000 residents will be living in the multi-tower developments surrounding Square One.

"We're very fortunate that the retail centres are going to act as the anchor to the communities," Sherif Masood, head of development and asset management at Oxford Properties, told CBC News in an interview.

Masood said his company is keen on playing a meaningful part in creating more homes in and around Toronto.

"On paper, we have the opportunity to build 50,000 residential units across the GTA," Masood said.

"There's a real opportunity to address the housing crisis in Canada.… I think we have a big, big opportunity to play a part in that."

Farther east, developers are planning to build condominiums and a new urban district called Pickering City Centre beside the town's local mall. 

Real estate company CentreCourt Developments announced last August its plan to build 10 high-rise condominium buildings around the Pickering Town Centre — as tall as 55 storeys — which will include more than 6,000 residences.

Monica Chadha, the national retail leader at EY Canada, said shopping malls are tapping into people's appetite for convenience.

"They literally want to work, shop, play in a walkable community, so these retail assets are fundamentally creating an environment such that it does balance amongst retail as well as amongst the other areas that they have in their portfolio," she said.

In principle, Stephens said, he agrees with turning "asphalt into an asset," but there's a catch.

"The problem I have with it is that you're building residential space around what is fundamentally a decaying asset."

Curated entertainment 

Stephens and Chadha say mall-goers aren't simply interested in a shopping. What they want is an experience.

One the best examples of a modern mall, he said, is the Grove, an open-air shopping destination in Los Angeles, California. 

"There really is sort of a vibe there. There's a sense of entertainment. It's a place where you go for leisure," he said.

The Well at Spadina Avenue and Front Street is reminiscent of that same design in many ways. Plus, there's housing all around.

The bright multi-level architectural phenom is sheltered by a 35,000-square-foot glazed canopy roof. Last winter, it featured skating rinks, and all year round there are art installations and pop-up events.

Stephens said these two shopping centres are offering something people can't get lying in bed on their phone.

"Ostensibly, you could live in your home and never have to leave to go to the store or, you know, go anywhere, but we crave the social interaction," he said. "We're social creatures."

Masood said Oxford Properties already puts on hundreds of events each year, knowing that "customers are absolutely looking for that opportunity to be entertained, to be surprised."

"We brought a Barbie experience to Square One. We brought a Friends and The Office experience here to Yorkdale," he said.

He said his teams scour the globe in search of the answer to: "'How do you curate an experience that's worthy of getting off your couch and coming to the mall every day and having fun and being with your friends?'"

Chadha said the goal is a mall that creates a sense of community. 

"So it's not only [about] the stores that they have and the merchandise that they're carrying, the food that's offered, but it's also celebrating key milestones within the community underneath their roof," she said.

"It's meant to be a community hub."