Limited Too
Created in 1987 as an offshoot of The Limited, it grew into the tween mall temple — the glittery, flared-jeans cathedral where girls a few years too old for kids' stores but too young for juniors discovered who they wanted to become. Then, between 2008 and 2010, it vanished.
The Limited, Inc. created Limited Too in 1987 as a girls' fashion offshoot, and by 1995 it had grown from 2 stores to 288. In 1996, new management refocused the chain into a dedicated preteen girls' fashion store — and Limited Too became a destination. Kids saved birthday money for pilgrimages; the glitter graphic tees, flared jeans, feathery pens, and lip-gloss displays by the register marked a liminal space between the toy aisle and the juniors section. The company spun off as Too, Inc. in 1999, then renamed itself Tween Brands, Inc. on July 10, 2006.
In February 2008 there were 582 Limited Too stores across 47 states and Puerto Rico. Then, on August 12, 2008, Tween Brands announced that its Limited Too locations would convert to its lower-priced Justice chain in early 2009. Between December 2008 and June 2010, 26 stores closed and 560 were rebranded. Limited Too vanished from malls across America.
The trademarks were later acquired by Bluestar Alliance, and the name has resurfaced through licensing revivals — but the physical temple is gone. For a generation of tweens, it marked the exact threshold between childhood and adolescence, a glittering rite of passage that lasted for two decades and then ended abruptly.
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