The real location behind Stranger Things Season 3 battle might surprise you-it wasn't what viewers think it was

Netflix's Stranger Things has always nailed the '80s vibe. It takes us on a ride to a small town in 80s America, a time when everything was changing and developing. The fashion, the culture, the food choices, the tech, everything was on the brink of a change. Season 3 premiered in 2019, and even though it answered some of the major plot points, it left us wondering about the Starcourt Mall.

But did you know that the pivotal filming location of Stranger Things Season 3 exists in real life? Yes, the Starcourt Mall might be fictional, but it is set in a Georgia shopping complex called the Gwinnett Place Mall in Duluth.

Stranger Things Season 3: Why is the Starcourt Mall so relevant?

Starcourt wasn't just a backdrop. It was the heartbeat of Hawkins that summer. It pulled everyone in, kids, adults, and even monsters.

Starcourt Mall can easily be tagged as the epicentre of everything that occurs in Season 3. It quickly became Hawkin's social centre apart from the Community Pool. For the kids and teens, it was everything.

Steve Harrington took a job at Scoops Ahoy, where he met Robin and turned work into a running comedy act. Eleven and Max wandered through the stores, trying out new looks and a little freedom. Dustin, Lucas, and Mike found adventure in every corner. What looked like harmless fun soon turned into something much darker, hiding beneath the floors.

Starcourt's glossy exterior masked a sinister core. Beneath its tiled floors, Russian scientists secretly worked to reopen a gate to Upside Down. The very thing that lured Hawkins was built on the town's decay. The corridors hid an underground lab. The food court became the battle arena between Eleven and Mind Frayer. Even its destruction by fire in the finale mirrors the loss of innocence.

For characters, Starcourt became a turning point. It is here where Robin and Steve's friendship bloomed. It is here that Dustin's curiosity unearthed the Russian conspiracy. And for Hopper and Joyce, this became a setting of sacrifice and heartbreak.

Where is the fictional Starcourt Mall from Stranger Things Season 3 located?

Contrary to popular belief, the fictional Starcourt Mall from Stranger Things Season 3 is actually filmed in Gwinnett Place Mall in Duluth, Georgia. Unfortunately, the mall is mostly vacant as of 2025, even though it was a booming space in the 1980s. Gwinnett County purchased around 39 acres of the mall in 2021 for its Urban Redevelopment program.

Speaking to SFX magazine, production designer Chris Trujillo added that they had used around two storeys of the mall and a wing to shoot for Season 3,

"We have a giant new mall in season three, and it’s quite an endeavour. The idea and the hope was that we would find a closed-down shopping mall that we could shoot at. Maybe 15 years ago, that would have been possible – but Atlanta’s a growing city, so there are no closed-down malls. The one we’re shooting at is about 70% shut down."

In the same interview with SFX magazine, the Stranger Things location manager, Tony Holley, revealed how difficult it was to find an abandoned mall, and hence they decided to go with the partially closed-down mall.

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"We have taken over two storeys of a mall in Gwinnett County.The mall’s been slowly closing, so we took over a whole wing that was perfect for us architecturally. We’ve been working on it for eight weeks or so. We completely gutted it and restored all the facades and interiors of the stores, as well as the food court and its fountains. It’s epic. We don’t start shooting there until next weekend, but it’s been a huge undertaking and it’s really exciting."

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