‘A safe space for weirdos’: Beyblade community hosts final tournament at Lloyd Center’s food court

The Lloyd Center, the shopping mall that opened in Portland’s central eastside 66 years ago, will close to the public on Saturday, Aug. 8.

The mall has gone through many reinventions since it opened in 1960. In recent years, the impending shutdown meant rents were cheap and space was abundant. That led to an indie renaissance of small businesses and numerous gatherings hosted by eclectic community groups.

One of those community groups is the Portland Trail-Bladers, which isn’t a basketball organization, but a group that hosts Beyblade tournaments featuring battling metal tops.

On a recent Sunday afternoon, most of the restaurants are vacant on the top floor of Lloyd Center, but the food court is anything but quiet. About a hundred people crowd around tables, cheering loudly as metal spinning tops slam into each other.

“We actually got kicked out of a card store once because there were complaints from Magic players that it was too loud,” said organizer and competitive Beyblader David Le, known here by his handle “SushiGrade.” He was one of the people who scouted the Lloyd Center when the group was looking for an indoor place to play that would tolerate their spirited battles.

“No one was really using the food court,” Le said. “I figured, ‘Hey, let’s hang out here and see if there’s any noise complaints.’ There weren’t. And we kind of just stayed here ever since.”

The Trail-Bladers are one of the self-organized groups that pumped life into the nearly-dead mall in the past few years. There’s also been a regular zine meetup, the “Food Court 5000” 1980s-themed costumed mall-walking group, theatre performances, independent filmmakers and qigong classes.

Ilana “n_oodle” Stewart-Hipes thinks the Lloyd Center is part of why the Beyblade group has grown over the past few years.

“It’s kind of become a safe space for weirdos and people who wouldn’t fit in,” Stewart-Hipes said. “Portland is sorely lacking in third spaces,” she added. “And Lloyd Center ceased to be a mall when it ceased to be profitable. But then it kind of cultivated this really sweet third space community.”

That community atmosphere is part of what convinced Stewart-Hipes to pick up her childhood hobby of Beyblades as an adult.

“Everybody was really accepting and really sweet and there’s really great diversity in the group, too,” she said. “I played other trading card games and people are always really mean in those scenes and take it really seriously, but everybody here is so wholesome.”

Jessica Acosta came with her son, Jesus “Happy Hattie” Acosta-Ware, so he could play in the final tournament. She didn’t realize there was a community of people who played Beyblade competitively until her son told her about Portland Trail-Bladers.

“They’re all cheering each other on. I haven’t seen any malice or irritation at each other,” Acosta said. “There isn’t this big cutthroat atmosphere. I don’t see any judgment either. And that’s what I want for my kiddos.”

Daio Goodenough remembers coming to Lloyd Center as a kid and said today’s mall feels completely different. “It’s cool now,” she said. “It’s one of the only places where I feel like our culture is coming out. This feels like Portland to me. It’s nerdy. It’s weird. It’s on the fringe.”

Kelly “Bubbles Millennia” Davie has been competing in the all-ages tournaments alongside her 9-year-old kid for over a year, driving from Sandy most Sundays to play and shop at some of the independent retail stores that moved into the mall. She said the multi-generational group has helped both herself and her kid meet friends. “I think it’s very social. I think that just when you’re playing, it’s kind of interactive. You’re close quarters, your little tops are battling each other,” she said.

The final tournament has the food court packed shoulder-to-shoulder with about 100 people clustered in groups of three around square cafe tables, shouting and cheering as their tops battle.

Each table contains a Beyblade “stadium” — a plastic bubble about 2 feet by 2 feet. Most of the stadiums here have been personalized with stickers or art around the edges. Bladers will wait with their round metal “bey” tops and launchers until their name is called in the organized chaos.

Then they’ll compete against another blader in front of a judge, who films the battle in case of any discrepancies.

“I’m gonna get to 60 FPS to catch this gyroscopic violence in all of its glory. I will not miss a single frame,” said judge Garrett “CEOofChalupas” Hudson.

Players launch their beys into a stadium by pulling a plastic launcher. It’s all about whose top spins the longest — there’s an element of skill, but also an element of luck. It’s noisy, a little chaotic, and exactly the kind of atmosphere that kept people coming back, said Johnathan “Chief Bongo” Velasquez.

He says he’s watched the community grow from a few dozen people meeting in parks to this packed final Lloyd Center Tournament.

“The Lloyd Center has been like your favorite auntie. She takes care of you. Everything you need is here,” he said.

And to Velasquez, the mall’s closure represents more than the loss of a tournament venue.

“It’s bittersweet for sure,” he said. “It’s not just Beyblading. A lot of us who have lived in Portland grew up coming to this mall. So it’s going to be sad to see it go away.”

The Beyblade tournaments are headed to a new home at Gambit’s Games, which will be moving from the Lloyd Center to a new location in Northeast Portland. They’ll also rotate to BatCave Games in Vancouver, Washington.

But the mall that gave Portland’s Trail-Bladers — and so many other communities — a place to gather closes for good Saturday, Aug. 8.