Springer’s plans immersive Portland flagship in Old Port for 2027

Springer’s is betting that the next generation of fine-jewelry shoppers wants more than a display case and a sales counter. Its new Portland flagship at 455 Fore Street, slated to open in spring 2027, is designed around immersive luxury, personalized service and a more hospitality-driven client experience in the Old Port.

The move is also a statement about where everyday fine jewelry is being bought and how. Springer’s says the new location is a long-term investment in Portland’s downtown retail and hospitality community, not a retreat to a mall model. For shoppers weighing gold stacks, diamond studs or a single better-made daily ring, that kind of setting is meant to build confidence around a higher-ticket purchase that may be worn constantly, not saved for a special occasion.

Lilly Mullen, the fourth-generation owner, is leading the project and is the first woman in the family to run the business since its founding in 1870. Springer’s traces its start to George T. Springer, who opened in Saccarappa, now Westbrook, selling optical goods, stationery, artists’ materials, fancy goods and fine jewelry. The business changed hands in 1925, when Edmund Beaulieu bought it, and then shifted in 1947, when Ed Beaulieu Jr. moved the store to Congress Street in downtown Portland and narrowed the focus to jewelry.

That history matters because Springer’s is not presenting the Fore Street move as a fresh start so much as a continuation of a very old one. The company says it has stayed family-owned for four generations and has more than 155 years in Portland. It also plans to invite customers into the current 580 Congress Street store before it closes in 2027, a reminder that this relocation is as much about continuity as it is about scale.

Springer’s still operates in Bath, Maine, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and a 2024 profile put the company at 52 employees. Earlier coverage described a business that had already adapted to changing habits, from keeping customer notes on a Rolodex to moving that information online with wish lists and chat features. That evolution is exactly what the new flagship seems built to amplify: a more personal, more guided way to buy jewelry that is meant to be lived in every day, not locked away.